The Astronaut
by spookyshai
Summary: The war isn't over yet, but things are looking grim. Enter Luna and Ron into the Hogwarts of 1943, with motives of either bringing Tom Riddle to their side or, failing that, neutralizing him before he rises to power as Lord Voldemort. Combination character drama, mystery/adventure and slow-burn romance, ft. an all-star cast of Hogwarts students and faculty of years past. Buckle up.
1. Prologue & Chapter One

Recommended soundtrack for this chapter: "Brave For You" by The xx

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 **Prologue**

" _But you're dead," said Harry._

 _"Oh yes," said Dumbledore matter-of-factly._

 _"Then… I'm dead too?"_

 _"Ah," said Dumbledore, smiling still more broadly. "That is the question, isn't it? On the whole dear boy, I think not."_

 _They looked at each other, the old man still beaming._

 _"Not?" repeated Harry._

 _"Not," said Dumbledore._

 _"But…" Harry raised his hand instinctively toward the lightning scar. It did not seem to be there. "But I should have died — I didn't defend myself! I meant to let him kill me!"_

 _"And that," said Dumbledore, "will, I think, have made all the difference."_

 _Happiness seemed to radiate from Dumbledore like light, like fire: Harry had never seen the man so utterly, so palpably content._

 _"Explain," said Harry._

 _"But you already know," said Dumbledore. He twiddled his thumbs together._

 _"I let him kill me," said Harry. "Didn't I?"_

 _"You did," said Dumbledore, nodding. "Go on!"_

 _"So the part of his soul that was in me…"_

 _Dumbledore nodded still more enthusiastically, urging Harry onward, a broad smile of encouragement on his face._

 _"…has it gone?"_

 _"Oh yes!" said Dumbledore. "Yes, he destroyed it. Your soul is whole, and completely your own, Harry."_

 _"But then…"_

 _Harry glanced over his shoulder to where the small, maimed creature trembled under the chair._

 _"What is that, Professor?"_

 _"Something that is beyond either of our help," said Dumbledore._

 _"But if Voldemort used the Killing Curse," Harry started again, "and nobody died for me this time — how can I be alive?"_

 _"I think you know," said Dumbledore. "Think back. Remember what he did, in his ignorance, in his greed and his cruelty."_

 _Harry thought. He let his gaze drift over his surroundings. If it was indeed a palace in which they sat, it was an odd one, with chairs set in little rows and bits of railing here and there, and still, he and Dumbledore and the stunted creature under the chair were the only beings there. Then the answer rose to his lips easily, without effort._

 _"He took my blood," said Harry._

 _"Precisely!" said Dumbledore. "He took your blood and rebuilt his living body with it! Your blood in his veins, Harry, Lily's protection inside both of you! He tethered you to life while he lives!"_

 _"I live…while he lives? But I thought…I thought it was the other way round! I thought we both had to die? Or is it the same thing?"_

 _He was distracted by the whimpering and thumping of the agonized creature behind them and glanced back at it yet again._

 _"Are you sure we can't do anything?"_

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 **Chapter One**

When Harry Potter died, she knew it.

Not simply _knew_ in the way the others did — from hearing the Dark Lord's screams of triumph, the laughter of Bellatrix Lestrange, the loud weeping of Rubeus Hagrid. Luna Lovegood _felt_ her friend's soul as it was torn from his body like old, moth-eaten clothing. She shuddered. It hovered nearby for a moment, as if waiting for something — and then was gone.

Luna could almost see the empty place where it had been, in her mind's eye. It shimmered like the inside of a sea-shell, avoiding the light of the sun, making a space in the shadows.

When she came back to herself her mouth tasted of ashes, and she could hear Hermione, could hear Ron and Neville and Hannah and Minerva and Cho, Filius, Horace, Katie, Susan, … All of them, mourning as one. She imagined, even, that she could hear Cedric, and Myrtle, and the voices of all those who had ever loved Hogwarts, or Harry. And worst of all, she heard Ginny, poor Ginny, shrieking loudest of all as the body of the boy she loved was brought before her. Luna watched grimly, detachedly, as if she were not really inhabiting her body — just the way Marietta Edgecombe had hissed out in the hallway a few weeks ago, she thought ironically. _It's like she's not even there!_

It was a curious sort of emptiness. She supposed, upon considering it, that she was probably in shock.

This was not to say that Luna was not distraught. She felt herself to be drowning in a sea of happy memories, each one now stained with the piercing agony of reality. Harry teaching her how to cast a Patronus Charm. Going to Professor Slughorn's lovely party with Harry and watching that too-handsome, brash Quidditch player chase Hermione around the room. Feeding the little Thestral with Harry, as he quietly listened to her talk about her mother. Harry's eyes… his smile… the way his hair always made a fuss and never seemed to calm down, as if it wanted to tell everyone how brilliant his mind really was, how kind his heart, underneath the scar and the famous face of the Boy Who Lived. All things she would never see again, except in memory.

A loud _bang_ from somewhere off to her right side startled her out of her grief. A warning shot, breaking the stone of the great steps and sending chunks of debris clattering down them to the ground.

Their enemies were nearing. At the forefront was the man who was not a man, his face snake-like and hideously smug, eyes flashing red in triumph. _Calling himself Lord Voldemort and pretending he's more than human,_ she thought with a kind of hollow distaste. Luna knew better; he was less. She imagined she could smell the sulphur from where she stood, the telltale sign of a mind turned beyond hope — the brimstone-scented Viridian Torlinblot was especially attracted to madness, and the number on him must have been too many to count. But that didn't stop her from pitying him, faintly, far in the back of her mind. When he opened his mouth, she tuned out the sound and focused instead on the pale, bulbous Moon Frog that was croaking plaintively off by the lake, apparently up far past its bed-time.

Then Neville rose to say something, and Luna turned her head back to the confrontation. She noted, without ill will or surprise but a tiny pang of disappointment, that Draco had gone to be with his parents on the other side. She couldn't blame him, she supposed, but after he'd saved Harry from Bellatrix Lestrange at Malfoy Manor, a part of her had hoped he might stay and fight with them. They needed every witch and wizard they could get.

 _People die every day,_ Neville was saying. He was being very brave, Luna thought with a sad sort of pride. She did not know if any of them were going to make it out of this alive, but if Neville was going to keep fighting… well.

She'd do what she could.

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A/N: Oh, don't you worry. This is just the beginning. In the meantime, check out the 8tracks mix ( /spookyshai/the-astronaut) I made to accompany this fic. The first chapter will be up in the next day or two. :) xo shai


	2. Chapter Two

Recommended soundtrack for this chapter: "Stray Italian Greyhound" by Vienna Teng

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 **Chapter Two**

The second skirmish proved messier than the first, if not quite as deadly - taking with it nearly half of the castle's east wing, but very few additional fatalities on their side. Despite the initial rush of their victory, the Death Eaters were getting tired, and many of them did not remember the run of the school as well as the students and faculty did. Currently the two factions had reached a sort of temporary stalemate, one of the deceptively calm hours that fell between Voldemort's repeated attempts to storm the school. This one was lasting longer than the others, and had so far stretched out for a few days. Everyone knew better than to hope for much more, but nearly all the remaining adults were in the Hospital Wing and the students' faith in an achievable victory was beginning to dwindle.

Luna was sitting quietly on the floor in front of the fire in the Gryffindor common room, along with Hermione, Ron, and Neville, who were all sitting woodenly on the plush furniture as if it were made of porcupine quills. Ginny was upstairs in the girls' dormitory, where she had remained since the last attack had ended. Luna had brought her up some food from the house-elves' (blessedly unharmed) kitchens earlier that day, only to find that the tray from the previous day had gone untouched. She'd left Ginny sobbing quietly on her bed, reflecting with a tinge of bitterness that any comfort she might try to provide now would be so inadequate as to be useless. The fire snapped and popped angrily, as if echoing her frustration.

One of the flames next to her leapt a little higher than the others, and her mind took her to the mythical, menacing Heliopaths of bedtimes past. Her father always told the best stories — these days she didn't care if they had been true or not.

 _Until he betrayed Harry Potter. And was killed._

Luna watched the fire vacantly.

"We've got to kill the bastard somehow," said Ron suddenly. "If only we could get at that damned snake."

"He knows better than that," Hermione pointed out in a soft voice. "He won't let it near the castle again, not while we're holed up in here."

"D'you suppose we could send someone out?" suggested Neville, not sounding very hopeful. "You know… to find it?"

Nobody bothered to respond. Moving slowly, Luna hunched her shoulders and buried her face in her knees. The fire was so hot on her right arm that it was becoming numb with pain, and she could feel Wrackspurts buzzing in her ears, but she couldn't bring herself to care.

"What are you all doing?"

An unexpected voice, cracking and hoarse but still holding a kind of stubborn strength, interrupted the silence. Luna looked up to see Ginny, haggard and pale, her bloodshot eyes flicking around to stare at each of them in turn.

"Ginny," Ron croaked, getting up and moving as though he intended to embrace her, but his sister batted his arms away, a furious glint in her eye.

"How are you just _sitting here?_ Why aren't any of you doing anything to save Harry?" she demanded of them all, her mouth flattening into a hard line.

There was a stunned, uncertain silence. Luna shook her head quickly, to clear it of Wrackspurts, and Ginny looked at her sharply before Hermione spoke.

"Ginny," she began in a strained voice, "Harry's — "

"I _know_ Harry's dead," Ginny snapped. "Don't patronise me, Hermione."

Ron, apparently still stung from her rejection of a hug after three days of no contact, spoke up in a harsh voice. "Well, what the hell do you expect us to do? Summon a bunch of Inferi and hope he's among them so we can prance around with his rotting body? Paint his damned _portrait?_ Don't be so naïve," he snarled. His ears were scarlet with anger by the time he finished speaking.

"You know better than to think magic can bring back the dead, Ginny," Hermione added, sounding tired and, to Luna's now-clear ears, close to crying.

Ginny scoffed. "Oh, come on. I should think you, _of all people_ , ought to know what I have in mind. I'm not talking about _bringing him_ _back._ " She looked around at them all, that furious light still in her eyes, as if it were obvious what she meant. No response came.

Finally Luna looked up, her eyes floating from Hermione to Ginny and back. "Of all people," she said in her high, wispy voice. "Are you talking about her Time-Turner?"

Ginny made an impatient gesture of assent.

"I haven't _got_ my Time-Turner, Ginny," Hermione grated out, sounding angrier now. "I gave it back to Professor McGonagall at the end of term, and if she was following regulations — which we _know_ she was — then she must have returned it to the Ministry." Ginny's scowl deepened.

"Hold on," Neville interrupted, "I might — hold on," and launched out of his chair to run up to the boys' dormitory. A tense silence filled the room as they listened to him clatter around upstairs.

A few minutes later he bolted back down and stumbled a little as he came to an abrupt halt at the foot of the staircase, quickly holding up the object he'd retrieved from among his possessions.

" _Traversing Time_ by Oliver Edward Stransbury," he said. "Professor Vector gave it to me at the end of fifth year — well — I've always been rubbish at Arithmancy, but she liked me and knew I was interested in experimental spellwork, for figuring out how to deal with those walking cacti Professor Sprout just got in from America — and she said I might find it a good read. I've been hiding it from the Carrows, because — well, because," he finished off, taking a long, shaky breath. He handed the book to Hermione, who took it with trembling hands, eyes bright.

She perused it quietly for a few minutes as the others looked on, her brow growing steadily more furrowed. When she looked up, the light in her eyes was gone, and she shook her head slowly, lips tight.

"There are some experimental time travel spells in here, but none of them are built for stabilised temporal relocation," she said. "When you're using a Time-Turner it isn't a problem, because Time-Turners are built to be — sort of like both the ship and the anchor. As long as you have it with you, spontaneous temporal displacement isn't a problem." She looked up, her gaze heavy. "With these spells… we'd be lucky if we could stay put in another time for more than five minutes."

"That is a problem," admitted Ginny in a quieter voice.

Luna, meanwhile, was deep in thought. Abruptly, she shook herself and stood, padding barefoot to where Hermione sat looking as though she were debating whether she wanted to burst into tears or collapse from exhaustion. When Luna reached her, she looked up.

"Hermione," Luna said softly, "this isn't an unsolvable problem." She took her friend's hand and squeezed it encouragingly. "If I remember your academic inclinations correctly, we've both taken advanced Arithmancy and spellcrafting classes before. You did the artefact creation project around the end of term. How different can this really be?"

Hermione simply looked at her for a moment, thinking, and then the ghost of a smile began to play on her lips.

"You know, Luna, sometimes I forget you were sorted into Ravenclaw."

Had she been a slightly more typical Ravenclaw, Luna's feelings might have been hurt. As it was, she took it as a compliment, and smiled.

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After spreading the word to the rest of the students, the next eight hours were spent in a frenzied rush of brainstorming, theorising, and experimentation. Hermione and Luna did most of the heavy lifting, metaphorically speaking, but they had some help from Neville (who turned out not to be _quite_ so rubbish at Arithmancy) and Ron, who kept them grounded and thinking practically. Ginny, who really was rubbish at all things Magical Theory, proclaimed that she would go mad if she didn't get out of Gryffindor Tower and busied herself with bringing them snacks from the kitchens and keeping watch for Voldemort's followers.

Just after Ginny had brought up their second array of eatables and gone back down into the main part of the castle, Hermione, Luna and Neville were trying to puzzle out how to properly enchant an anchor that was capable of holding a temporal focus without being too cumbersome to move around. They were all three of them bedraggled and exhausted, but hadn't yet reached the point of a total halt in productivity. Ron was taking a break, napping in one of the armchairs by the now long-dead embers in the fireplace.

"What if we alternated the temporal focus between two separate anchors? Smaller ones."

"No, that wouldn't stabilise it properly, look at the equations again. Besides, if the two of them got farther than five feet away, you'd be off like a shot. What if you were to drop one?"

"Maybe the problem isn't the surface area of the anchor after all — is it something to do with density, do you think?"

"I don't see how that would help with our mobility problem."

"Has anyone considered a shrinking spell?"

"No, that would narrow the temporal curve, look here — we don't want it to be impossible to get back, just not wildly swinging back and forth."

So the conversation went, each of them exchanging thoughts and arguments and the occasional _is that a Blibbering Humdinger?_ in hushed voices. Apparently they had not been quiet enough, however, because Ron suddenly spoke from where he sat in the corner of the room.

"I know you're all… working really hard on this." He opened his mouth as if he wanted to say more, then closed it again and after a moment added, "But have we thought about what we're actually going to do once we figure it all out?"

The other three were silent. A creaking step alerted them to the return of Ginny.

"Isn't it obvious?" she said, looking around. "We have to kill him."

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A/N: Starting to get things rolling now. I didn't want to make the chapters too terribly long to start off, but they'll begin to get a bit heftier as the story progresses. Please R&R! xo shai


	3. Chapter Three

Recommended soundtrack for this chapter: "Late Night" by Foals, "Perfect World" by Broken Bells

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 **Chapter Three**

The room was dead silent for a full minute before anyone spoke.

"Murder is not an option, Ginny," replied Luna in an unusually sharp tone. When she looked up, her silvery eyes were hard.

Ginny stared back, unyielding. "None of you knows him better than I do," she retorted, addressing the room. "And I'm telling you, it's the only way."

Ron stood slowly. "I… think I'm with Ginny on this one," he affirmed. "'S obviously not ideal, but these are some pretty extreme circumstances, aren't they?"

Ginny shot him a grateful glance, and added, "The most extreme." She folded her arms and raised her eyebrows at Luna, then sighed. "Look, I'm sorry, Luna, I really am. I appreciate your sense of… high ideals… But there's a time and a place for that. We have to look for a practical solution here."

"No," Luna insisted flatly. "If that's what we're going to use this for, I can't be a part of it."

"Luna's right," Neville put in sturdily. "We can't be like him. There has to be another way."

"Well — what would you suggest instead, Luna?" Hermione hurriedly asked, her eyes darting between the other four. "Neville?"

Luna was silent for a moment, thinking. Then, "We know why he became this way. The Horcruxes… the murder. There has to be a way to stop it. Show him something better. Something nice." She nodded firmly, glancing at Neville, who gave a reassuring smile back.

"Something _nice?_ " Ginny sputtered. "Luna, just think for a minute! Tom Riddle was — _is_ — the Heir of Slytherin! He _killed_ Moaning Myrtle _while he was at school_ — do you _really_ think you could possibly get through to a fucking _psychopath_?" Her voice was inflecting wildly as she grew more and more agitated.

"Yes," said Luna serenely, gazing at Ginny with a sort of owlish, unblinking focus.

Ginny made a noise that was half growl, half snort, and sat down heavily on the armchair Ron had been occupying a few moments before.

"How about this," Hermione ventured carefully. "We send two people back to a time when Voldemort is vulnerable — probably his school years, as we wouldn't have much trouble fitting in and knowing the lay of things. One of you does what Luna's saying — try to get through to him, maybe make friends. Convince him that what he's doing is wrong." Her brown eyes moved steadily between Ginny and Luna. "If that fails, we kill him. Agreed?"

Ginny raised her eyebrows again at Luna, who merely said, "It's your soul, I suppose."

Satisfied, Ginny retreated up the stairs to get some sleep. Luna, yawning, lay down on the floor by the empty fireplace to catch a few minutes' rest as well while Neville left the Tower to check that all was still quiet. Ron and Hermione curled up together on the sofa.

When the sound of Luna's quiet snores reached the other two, Ron shifted to face Hermione, frowning. Considerate of their sleeping friend, his voice was barely a whisper.

"Do you — I mean, Hermione, do you _really_ think anybody would be able to get through to that — I mean, a monster like him…"

"No," she murmured with a sigh. "I don't. I'm not even sure he deserves that chance. But Luna is right… if that fails, it's one of our souls on the line. Killing him should be a last resort."

"If that's the case…" He paused. "You're not going to like this."

Hermione was silent for a moment. "You want to go instead of Ginny," she said finally. Her voice was thick with barely-contained tears. "You want me to let you kill him instead of her."

Ron nodded, taking a deep, slow breath.

"I can't," she whispered. "Ron, please don't make me do this. Let me go instead, or — or something."

"None of us will be able to cast the spell without you, Hermione," he said firmly. "You're the most brilliant witch I've ever met. You have to be the one to do it." He shifted around a little more to look in her eyes. "You're the only one I trust."

A tear crept out of the inside corner of her eye and down her nose, and her chin crumpled as she resisted the urge to argue. Finally, Hermione nodded, burying her face in his chest.

"Just promise… you'll be careful. That your _soul_ — " her voice caught and she sniffed, restraining a sob, " — will be the _only_ thing that comes back broken." Almost inaudibly, she added, "I can't lose you."

 _Too_ hung between them in the air, unspoken.

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Five and a half hours later, the students still had no answer to the problem of the temporal anchor. It seemed an impossible dilemma; no magical object or material that any of them could think of seemed capable of holding a temporal focus at a manageable size and weight. At last, Hermione suggested heavily that they might try going up to the Hospital Wing and seeing after the condition of Professor Vector, who had been hit with a particularly nasty curse during the second wave of attacks and had fallen into a magical coma. It seemed unlikely that she would wake anytime soon given the extent of her injuries, but the group was running out of options and had little choice but to hope for a miracle.

When Hermione, Neville, and Luna arrived at the Hospital Wing, it was much fuller and much quieter than it had been since the last time any of them had been there. As Madame Pomfrey was herself incapacitated by some variant of the Skull-Swelling Hex which made it difficult for her to move, the Wing was being operated by a team of students — all excellent healers, but who were all clearly running themselves ragged with the amount of work. Luna wondered a little regretfully if she had been using her time properly; she likely could have been of some help here, despite her minimal knowledge of serious healing techniques. Hannah Abbott, who had been elected as their leader, looked as if she hadn't slept in several days. When Neville asked after Professor Vector, a white-faced and heavily freckled second year led them to her bedside.

"She hasn't woken up on her own yet," the boy explained in a thin, tired voice. "We might be able to wake her with _rennervate_ , but Hannah says it's best for her if we wait." Hermione sighed and nodded. Despite the urgency of their mission, no one was willing to risk Professor Vector's safety.

"Maybe we could ask one of the other professors," offered Neville. "I'm sure one of them must have an idea of what to do."

"Ho there!" came a weak voice from a few beds over. "Are you in need of help?" Professor Slughorn, his face waxen and sweating, but with a determined gleam in his eye, was struggling to sit up. Glancing at each other, the three students quickly made their way to his bedside.

"You mustn't overexert yourself, Professor," Hermione said, looking worried.

"Nonsense, nonsense," Slughorn puffed, pushing himself into a sitting position. "Now — what's the plot? A new chink discovered in You-Know-Who's armour, perhaps?" He looked hopeful.

Luna and Hermione exchanged looks. "You could say that," said Luna finally. "But not quite in the way you might imagine. We think we might have found a way… to save Harry."

"Save Harry!" echoed Slughorn breathlessly, tears coming to his eyes. "Indeed? Not thinking of trying to raise the dead, are you?" he added as an afterthought, with some trepidation.

"No, no, it's nothing like that," Hermione assured him. "We're trying to work out a way to…" Her voice grew quieter out of habit — as they all knew, the topic was something of a taboo among learned wizards due to the immense risks it posed to the wizarding world at large. "Sir, we want to use time travel. Stop Harry getting killed and… well, we don't want to be overly optimistic, but we're hoping to fix quite a lot." She looked at him anxiously. "You wouldn't happen to know anything about time magic, would you, Professor?"

Slughorn's brow furrowed. "I'll be honest with you, my dear, it's not exactly my area of expertise. Perhaps I might be of some little help to you, though… What seems to be the, er, nature of the problem?"

"Well, it's like this — " Neville stepped forward, holding up the parchment that held the greatest amount of their work, and quickly explained the issue.

When he finished, Slughorn was frowning more deeply. "I'm afraid I'm somewhat lost on a good deal of this," he admitted finally. "But have you considered using a bezoar?"

Almost immediately, Hermione's eyes glazed over. "Thank you for your time, Professor — " she began a little brusquely, but Slughorn held up a hand.

"No, no, Miss Granger, wait a minute. I know that as Potions Master, I'm not your first choice to ask about this. But it sounds to _me_ — " he gave her a pointed look, "as if you're searching for a magical material that can hold a heavy enchantment, for a long period of time, without deteriorating. Is that correct?"

Hermione's lips flattened in impatience. "That's part of it, but — "

"Wait _just_ a minute, Miss Granger," Slughorn repeated, looking a little put out. "Really, I know this is a matter of some urgency, but listen to me for just a moment." He looked around at all of them. "Bezoars are primarily known for their use in relation to poisons, it's true, but they really have astounding, as-yet-untapped magical potential in other areas as well. We still aren't sure why the bezoar acts as a magical panacea, when nothing about its creation seems magical at all. But _as_ a magical substance, it is, simply put, unique. If you've been down the list and nothing seems to have worked thus far, that would be my suggestion." He settled back onto his cot, clearly exhausted from his tirade.

Hermione took a breath as if to snap at him, then paused and closed her mouth, evidently deep in thought.

"Thank you very much, Professor," said Luna, and tugged Hermione's hand for her to follow as she and Neville turned to leave.

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Later that night, at about three in the morning, Luna and Ron were each holding an enchanted bezoar and standing in elaborately drawn chalk circles on the floor of the library. Ginny was standing with her back to them, lips twisted in worry and anger at Ron's insistence that he take her place, while Neville helped Hermione set up the rest of the spell.

Suddenly Ginny whirled around, her face looking as though the worry had overtaken the anger. "Remember the plan," she blurted desperately. "Go to Dumbledore first, and if that doesn't work out, try McGonagall. _Don't_ lose the bezoar. If you need to get back, just say the counterspell — and don't draw too much attention — you haven't got solid backgrounds, either of you. If somebody starts nosing round and looking into you, you're finished."

"Thanks ever so," Luna teased softly with a little smile. Although she felt badly about it for Ron's sake, she was still rather glad that Ginny was staying behind and wouldn't be risking her own soul in the venture.

Ginny rolled her eyes and gave them both quick, too-hard hugs, thrusting Hermione's enchanted bag — which held all their necessary possessions and supplies — into Luna's hands. "Don't forget that," she mumbled, and hugged her friend again.

"Ready," said Neville, looking apprehensive, and Ginny backed away.

Hermione's eyes flicked between the two of them, carefully not-anxious. "Are you both feeling okay? Everything set? Any questions?"

"Fine on all sides," answered Ron, looking a bit on edge.

"Fine," echoed Luna, clutching the moke-skin bag and swaying a little in her chalk circle.

Hermione raised her wand and pronounced the incantation clearly, and the two of them vanished in a spray of orange sparks and citrus-scented smoke.

"A bit flashy, don't you think?" Ginny mumbled, eyes overbright.

"I didn't craft the damned spell," Hermione choked out, herself still fighting tears.

A moment later, both of them burst into a fit of giggles.

Neville, after a moment of silence, only shook his head good-naturedly and set to work cleaning up the chalk on the floor.

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A/N: Slightly longer chapter this time. I got impatient! I'm really excited to get this rolling. Please shoot me a kudos or a comment if you're enjoying the story! xo shai


	4. Chapter Four

Recommended soundtrack for this chapter: "Everyone Is Dark" by New Canyons, "Pink Mist" by Gunship

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 **Chapter Four**

Luna and Ron stumbled, a few seconds later by their perception, into a large and very dark thicket of trees. After looking around a moment, Ron spoke in a whisper.

"Forbidden Forest, d'you think?"

"Yes, it looks very much like it to me," came Luna's high, doubtful reply. "Although I can't say I remember this part of the forest."

"Well, there's the castle — I'd say maybe the edges of the forest are closer in than they are in our time. This bit might not have been there. Won't… be there," he amended with a pained expression, then mumbled, "This time stuff is already giving me a headache."

"I don't think it's the thinking, Ron," Luna commented, eyes fixed on something in the foreground of the castle. "My head's not feeling very well either. And I can't… I can't see the kinds of things I can… you know — " she glanced at him and saw his understanding nod " — as well as I usually can. They're sort of blurry." Her pale brow furrowed in consternation.

He looked at the heavy night sky and said, "What time do you suppose it is? Will anybody be awake?"

"Professor Dumbledore, almost certainly," she murmured back. "From what I remember, he tends to sleep at rather odd hours, and not very much at all. But first we need to get into the castle without being noticed by anybody… the caretaker is probably awake too."

"I'll check the map," Ron muttered, and pulled out one of Harry's possessions which had been stuffed into their hands by Hermione about ten minutes before their departure. He poked it with his wand and intoned, "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good." Black ink spiderwebbed across the parchment, forming the familiar Marauders' Map.

Ron squinted at it for a moment in the moonlight, it apparently having not occurred to him to light his wand. "Looks like the only people awake are… Dumbledore, Dippet — I think that's the Headmaster — and some bloke called Crassus Thornfield. He's wandering about the entrance to the castle."

"That'll be the caretaker, then," Luna remarked dreamily. "We'll have to wait until he goes to bed."

Ron sat down and leaned against one of the less gnarly trees, the map spread out in front of him. He looked up at Luna. "Well, make yourself comfortable. It's not as though we're going anywhere anytime soon, from the looks of this fellow."

Luna sat cross-legged next to him, watching the faded, ghostly forms of the creatures in front of the castle, and sighing in frustration when she again failed to bring them properly into focus.

The two of them sat in silence for a few moments, taking in the sight of the grounds minus Hagrid's hut and the pumpkin patch. It looked curiously empty and overbalanced, with the line of the Forbidden Forest overreaching its usual boundary by a few yards. The sound of crickets was intrusively, startlingly loud, and Luna dug her hands into the soft earth by her hip. "I wonder if it's rained recently," she mused aloud. Ron did not reply.

After another minute she said, "Have you thought about what name you're going to give them? I mean… you can't use your own, there's probably a Weasley at the school now, isn't there?"

He nodded slowly. "That'd be… old Everett Weasley, I'm assuming. My third great-uncle. I only met him once, when I was — I think five or so. He was killed by… some animal." He scrunched up his nose, attempting to remember. "I don't know. Just glad his wife won't be here." Ron shuddered. "Great-aunt Tessie went to school in Australia."

Luna watched him impassively, her wide eyes appearing nearly white in the light of the moon. "I haven't got any family here at the moment," she commented. "My mum and dad won't be here until the sixties… and my grandfather didn't go to a wizarding school." She did not choose to elaborate. Her father hadn't liked to talk about Ophiuchus Lovegood, whom she had only met twice in her life, and she knew next to nothing about her grandmother except that she had been dead at least twenty years. Her mother, as well, had been orphaned at a young age and had hardly ever spoken of her parents to Luna — who, being nine at her oldest before Pandora died, had rarely asked. There had never seemed to be a need for grandparents when the three of them had always been so happy together.

Blinking back a sudden film of tears, Luna ran her fingers over the roots of the tree at her back, wondering how far underground they stretched, invisible to the casual observer. If the tree were upside-down with its trunk in the ground, would its roots then reach to the moon?

"Huh," said Ron, then glanced at the map before looking back at the castle. "I think I'll go with Ron Granger." When Luna smiled in his peripheral vision, he added hurriedly, "Hermione's parents are Muggles, so there's no danger of encountering an unexpected relative of hers or something. _Don't_ tell her."

"I think it's rather sweet, actually," she murmured back. "But if it's that important to you, then your secret is safe with me." She drew her hands out of the dirt and folded them on her lap. "What was Harry's mother's name?"

Ron looked sidelong at her. "Lily. Lily Evans."

"Evans," she hummed, and blew out her breath, nodding. "Luna Evans. That sounds perfectly nice to me."

"You don't need a fake name," Ron pointed out. "Besides, being a Pureblood might give you some extra clout with… _him._ "

"Oh. That's true," she answered, a little disappointed. She wasn't sure she wanted to make friends on the basis of her blood purity, anyway, but with someone like Voldemort one had to start somewhere. After another minute, she turned to look at him. "I don't mean to be nosy, Ron, but could I ask you something?"

"Shoot," he replied. At her puzzled look, he flapped a hand abortively. "Something Harry said once. Go ahead."

She watched him carefully. "You've been acting… very put together these past few days. But Harry was your best friend. Not to mention what happened with your brother." She dropped her hands to the ground again and shifted her position, as the flat earth was beginning to feel uncomfortable. "How are you doing, really?"

Ron let out a long sigh. "I don't know. It's felt a bit like… I don't have time to react as I should. Hermione's usually so collected, and she's been falling to pieces recently… I just felt like one of us should be strong, you know? She's done so much already, I thought — hey!" He sat up straighter and nudged Luna with his elbow. "I think Thornfield's gone to bed. Look."

Luna moved her hair behind her ear and leaned over to peer at the map. Indeed, Crassus Thornfield had moved into a smallish room a little ways off from the entrance to the castle and was no longer moving. "I suppose that's our cue to go," she agreed. "Is Professor Dumbledore still in his office?"

Ron checked. "Yeah." He levered himself off the ground, tapping the map with his wand and muttering _mischief managed._ "Let's go."

Luna rose, entwining her dirty hands together, and smiled brightly at him. "After you."

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

The two of them were able to enter the castle without much difficulty, although Ron lamented the loss of Harry's Invisibility Cloak, which would have proven extremely useful but had been lost back in their own timeline sometime during the third wave of attacks. At length, they reached the stairs which led up to the Headmaster's office, and then stopped.

Ron huffed. "Well, bollocks. We haven't got the password… I suppose we can just start saying the names of different candies until it works," he ventured.

Luna frowned. "Wait — Wait." She caught Ron's sleeve. "Ron, remember, Professor Dumbledore's not Headmaster. It's 1943. He's the…" She thought hard for a moment. "Transfiguration Master. I think. So he'd have Professor McGonagall's old office."

Ron slapped his forehead. "Right. Sorry." Then he glanced at her with a humorous glint in his eye. "You mean McGonagall's _future_ office."

Luna laughed lightly and started walking in the direction of the Transfiguration Master's office. Shaking his head, Ron jogged after her.

The two of them made the not-insubstantial distance across the castle in record time. When they reached the heavy wooden door, Ron hesitated; Luna, however, immediately raised a hand and knocked politely. No use wasting time.

"Come in," came Dumbledore's voice after a moment, sounding perturbed. Luna spared a glance for Ron, who looked faintly green, and opened the door.

A startlingly young Albus Dumbledore was standing behind a large mahogany writing desk in the middle of the room; he couldn't have been older than fifty-five, and his beard was a muted ginger instead of the familiar brilliant snow-white Luna remembered. An impressive accumulation of books, papers, and miscellaneous magical objects lay scattered about the desk and all around the room, in such a way that it was obvious that the room's inhabitant knew exactly where each item lay and had placed them as such intentionally. In the corner, on a little perch, sat a bright-eyed, brilliantly plumed phoenix. Luna couldn't help smiling; Fawkes had been a friend to her during many of her more unpleasant times at Hogwarts. As she watched, the bird tilted its head and trilled at her.

This brief interaction was not missed by Dumbledore, who briefly scrutinised Fawkes before turning to face Ron and Luna. "I'm terribly sorry," he said in his low, polite baritone. "I can't seem to recall your names." His sharp eyes landed on each of them in turn, and it looked as though he was perfectly aware of the reason why this was the case.

"That's because we aren't students," Luna replied calmly. "Not current ones, anyway."

Ron shot her an exasperated look. "Yes, let's lead with that, shall we?" he growled. Luna met his eyes and shrugged unapologetically.

The two of them looked back at Dumbledore, who sat down behind his desk, watching them evenly. "I think the two of you had better explain yourselves," he said, "before I report you to the Headmaster for trespassing."

"May we sit?" inquired Luna, and without waiting for a response, conjured a tall, sunflower-patterned chair for her and Ron each, and sat. Ron, after standing in silence for a moment, belatedly followed suit and fixed Dumbledore with a somewhat self-consciously intense expression.

"Now," said Luna, "there is a student currently at this school by the name of Tom Riddle. Is that correct?"

Dumbledore's brows drew down. "If you two are asking for my help in _harming_ a student of mine — _any_ student — "

"No, no," said Luna hurriedly, although Ron glanced at her, looking uncomfortable at the half-lie. "You see — well, it's a bit complicated…" She floundered briefly, wondering where to start.

"We're from the future," Ron said solidly, "from the year 1998. Tom Riddle is a Dark Wizard calling himself Lord Voldemort, and we're in the middle of a war between those loyal to Hogwarts, and his followers." He looked down, frowning, before continuing, "A war we aren't very likely to win."

"He's committed a great many atrocities," Luna put in softly. "Killed people, tortured people, stole things. He killed our friend." She paused, and went on almost inaudibly, "Quite a lot of our friends, actually."

Dumbledore was silent for a moment, taking this in, and then sighed heavily. "I might have known," he said, with a sad sort of resignation. "I always had my suspicions about Tom, but I still had some hope that he might be willing to change, that he might… how does one say it? … turn out."

"Well, he didn't," Ron responded, with a glance at Luna. "But we're here to try to change that. If we can." Luna nodded in affirmation.

"I see." Dumbledore drummed his fingers on his desk. "How do you plan to go about this? I must tell you, he is a… very closed-off young man. Even as a child, he possessed some deeply troubling characteristics, and if I may venture a guess, I would say he has likely changed very little since then. Except in stature, of course," he added, somewhat humorously, then turned somber again. "Befriending Tom Riddle to the point of altering his personality and motives will not be by any means an easy task."

"We weren't really hoping for easy," Luna admitted, looking somewhat more serious as well. "Just possible."

At this, Dumbledore opened his hands. "I'm not sure I need to mention this to either of you, but _possible_ is no sure thing either."

"You don't," Ron assured him, voice hard. Luna looked at him, and his eyes were unfocused and glittering with anger. It was clear he was thinking of Harry, and of Fred.

"Anyway," Luna began again, "we were hoping that perhaps you could help us… blend in. Get settled, and so forth. We haven't any proper aliases for this time, not really, so going through official channels and such would likely be rather difficult."

Dumbledore nodded. "Yes, that is understandable." Slowly, he stood, and looked between the two of them, his piercing eyes locking with theirs and seeming to understand everything about their intentions. "I will do the best I can to help you. But you'd best be warned: dealing with an altered timeline is tricky business. You may not always be able to predict how events will unfold, despite your knowledge of your own timeline. I can't promise either of you that your interference in events now will not lead to a worse future than the one you came from." He paused. "And if, or when, it comes down to a question of whether or not you are willing to murder Tom to obtain the outcome you want… do not expect any kind of assistance from me. Is that clear?"

"Yes," said Luna, meeting his eyes steadily. Ron, after a moment of hesitation, nodded.

Dumbledore sat back down. "Now, have the two of you discussed the matter of your houses?"

Ron and Luna looked at each other, a little uncertainly. "I'm a Gryffindor," Ron volunteered, "and Luna was in Ravenclaw…"

Dumbledore was already shaking his head. "I understand your desire to be among others like yourselves, especially in an unfamiliar time when you are likely to feel very isolated. However, I would recommend that you both consent to be placed in Slytherin."

Ron recoiled instinctively, but Luna's mouth quirked in thought. "I suppose it would be simpler that way," she commented. "With classes, and such. Easier to find ways to interact with him."

"Precisely," was Dumbledore's reply, but Ron didn't look any more comfortable with the idea.

"Look," he said through gritted teeth, "I'm not a Slytherin. Luna isn't either, but at least nobody will be staring at her wondering why she's there."

"Want to bet?" muttered Luna wryly, a corner of her lips curling upwards.

Ron continued as if she hadn't spoken. "If I get placed in Slytherin, I'll stick out like a sore thumb. It'll be obvious I'm not supposed to be there. No matter how much I try to keep my head down, just the fact that I look like a Weasley is reason enough for them to notice something unusual." He jerked his head at Luna. "Besides, she's the one who came with the plan of making friends with the little b- … bugger," he finished lamely. "I'm just… the backup."

Dumbledore's eyes were steely. "I see. Well, I suppose being in a different house would not impede your ability to be the… backup… if and when the time came."

"Right," said Ron, looking a little nervous.

"While we're at it," Dumbledore went on more coolly, "I suppose I should ask your names. Or at least, what names you are planning on answering to whilst you are undertaking this effort." He gazed at each of them, brows raised.

"I'm Luna Lovegood," Luna told him. "That's Ronald Weasley, as you might have figured out, but he'll be answering to Granger for the time being."

"Years?" inquired the professor, looking at the both of them as if he already had an estimate.

"Seventh and sixth," said Ron, "so, me and her, respectively. We'll be set back about eight or nine months, but it's not as though either of us was really learning much this past year, what with Voldemort's people being at the school and… me not being there and all." He cleared his throat, evidently uncomfortable with Dumbledore's sharp gaze being so closely trained on him.

"Fine, fine," Dumbledore replied absently. "The two of you can sleep in your house dormitories tonight. The start of term is in a few days, so the majority of students will not be arriving until then. Mr. Weasley — pardon me, Mr. Granger — I trust you know the way to your own common room; the current password is 'binglebangle.' Miss Lovegood, you are free to choose whether you would like to stay in the Ravenclaw or the Slytherin girls' dormitory for the time being. The password to the Slytherin common room is 'blackthorn.'" He peered at her for a moment. "Should you need assistance to reach the Slytherin common room, I'm sure Fawkes would be happy to oblige."

"That's all right," Luna demurred, although she nevertheless hoped for a later chance to spend some time with Fawkes while here. "I'm sure I can get there by myself." She stood, Vanishing her chair, and waited a moment for Ron to get up so she could do the same to his. Turning back to Dumbledore, she said, "Thank you very much for all your help."

Ron coughed, then echoed, "Yeah… thanks." He ducked out of the office quickly, making his way down the hall. Luna made to follow him, but at the last moment turned back to Dumbledore.

"Your head seems to be remarkably clear of Wrackspurts," she commented. To be honest it was difficult for her to tell at the moment whether anybody at all had Wrackspurts or not, but she trusted that it was true anyway, and it was her most favoured compliment. You could always tell a good person if you just looked at their ears.

Dumbledore's eyes crinkled in pleasure. "Thank you," he said, without any further comment. Luna smiled at him and ran off after Ron, to remind him that they needed to set up a time and place to rendezvous for the next day, and that he needed to pull his own trunk out of the moke-skin bag so that he had something to wear in the morning.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

A/N: Shameless plug time! We've still got a while to wait before our boy shows up, so in the meantime feel free to check out my TomLuna blog on tumblr (tunavibes) or the 8tracks mix I made for this fic (username spookyshai)! :) Thanks again for reading and don't forget to let me know your thoughts in the comments, or leave a kudos if you've enjoyed the story so far. xo shai


	5. Chapter Five

Recommended soundtrack for this chapter: "Killer" by Phoebe Bridgers, "Ophelia" by Marika Hackman

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

 **Chapter Five**

As it turned out, sleeping in the Slytherin common room under the lake (Luna had rejected the girls' dormitory for as long as she was reasonably able to keep out of it, finding its atmosphere intensely dark and draconian) was not nearly as unpleasant as she had originally expected. Although it had little natural light and was generally much cooler than the Ravenclaw common room, it nevertheless had a kind of unobtrusive, sophisticated ambiance which appealed to her somewhat solitary nature. Not to mention that there were, for the moment at least, no wayward feet tripping her in the hallway, no mischievous Nargles stealing her things, and no thoughtless tongues gleefully twisting her first name — bestowed so lovingly by her mother — into the hated epithet, _Loony._ The word had always tasted sour on her tongue, even before the first time she'd heard it directed at her. It was nice to have a break from hearing it.

Luna dressed carefully that morning. She had realised quickly that once Voldemort arrived at the school she would probably have to tone down her customary bright, eclectic style of dress in order to avoid attracting the wrong kind of attention — this being, of course, the kind of attention that might cause him to keep away and not speak to her. The fact that she was now forced to take note of this sort of thing, after she had so diligently failed to pay attention to other people's opinions of her for so many years of her life, was causing Luna no small amount of irritation and chagrin. She had noticed early in life that her personal style sometimes put people off, but she had been able to happily pretend those people away for as long as she could remember. Here and now, however, that was not an option. Although Luna was loath to abandon her favourite means of self-expression, she could not afford to be indulgent, even in such seemingly small matters as how she presented herself.

Therefore, Luna wanted to make these last days count; she wanted to dress as she liked, and as her mother had liked her to dress. Pandora had always complimented her taste in clothes as a child, had gladly opened her wardrobe for Luna and let her try on anything she liked — never saying that this and that clashed, or that her socks didn't match, or that those pearls were too formal to wear for everyday with jeans and a tee-shirt and little pink trainers. So Luna had always worn what she wanted, and not given a second thought to anybody who didn't like it.

Today she wore her favourite bright yellow sweater, a knee-length iris-print skirt that she had made herself, and purple striped socks. For good measure, because she knew she probably would have to put them away for a long while, she also donned her favourite pair of earrings — the ones Harry Potter had once compared to dirigible plums — and her Nargle-repellent cork necklace, which before the war she had hardly ever taken off, but which had been absent from her usual wardrobe of late. She was briefly tempted, although she almost never did so, to check her reflection before leaving for breakfast; as the Slytherin common room had no mirrors, however, she simply made her way to the Great Hall, where Ron was waiting.

He waved at her, and she went over to sit by him. The large, cavernous room was completely empty except for the two of them; presumably most of the faculty and staff had already eaten, as it was getting rather late. Ron seemed faintly uncomfortable at the oppressive silence, and Luna was glad of the opportunity to ameliorate it for him.

"Good morning, Ron," she greeted him, examining his face studiously as she checked him over for signs of Plimpy Sickness. Plimpy Sickness was a rare malady that induced hysterical insomnia, its contraction said to be typical in first-time time-travellers; she felt very lucky indeed to have escaped it herself. Ron, for his part, looked as though he had slept well enough. One could never be quite sure of Plimpy Sickness, it was true, but then again Ron didn't usually tend to hide his afflictions when he had them, often opting instead to complain rather loudly in a kind of half-plea for sympathy, half-attempt at humour. Hermione had typically seemed unable to decide whether she found this habit endearing or annoying, but Luna had never really minded either way.

"Did you sleep well?" she asked, just to be sure, and when he nodded — stifling a yawn — she leaned back, satisfied. After a moment he opened his mouth to speak, and she began filling her plate with food.

"Oh, hey, before I forget," Ron exclaimed suddenly, "what are you doing with your bezoar? I wasn't quite sure how to… handle mine. You know, a goat-stone… sort of disgusting when you think about it." He shifted uncomfortably.

"Actually, in our situation, it's very valuable," Luna informed him. "You want to keep it close at all times, so you know where it is. And don't break it, either." She took a sip of pumpkin juice. "Mine's in my shoe."

Ron was looking at her with a humorous glint in his eye. "Guess I've been keeping my treasures close to my heart, then, eh?" He patted the breast pocket of his robes. "I had a feeling leaving it in the dormitory would be a bad idea, but it still feels a bit odd, you know, just carrying it around…"

Luna's attention started to wander slightly — she was looking at the hangings over the different house tables and wondering if they were the same as in the 1990s, because it looked as though the material might be a bit different, heavier maybe, or thicker — when Ron cleared his throat. After a moment she registered the sound and looked back at him, her already high-set brows rising further.

"I actually wanted to talk to you about the plan," Ron said, taking a bite of his toast. "Do you have an idea of where you're going to start? I mean, with somebody like Riddle…" His voice was muffled by the toast, and he swallowed and went on, "with somebody like Riddle, you've sort of got to have a game plan — at least I think so; he'd have a game plan, anyway." He looked at her expectantly.

"I'll handle it," said Luna. Almost immediately afterward, she felt compelled to add, "I think they changed the hangings. They look almost… darker, somehow."

Ron coughed and looked briefly to the side, then back at her. He ignored the hangings comment. "That's all? You'll handle it." He ran a hand through his hair, looking stressed. "Luna — "

"I know you might not think I'm the best person for this, Ron," she interrupted, her musical voice perfectly even. "And that's fine. I don't think about things the way you do, I don't make plans the way you do, I don't think about strategies or tactics or that kind of thing at all, really. I usually just like to see where things go on their own, and they tend to work themselves out." She gave him a small smile and added, "I've never won a game of Wizards' Chess."

Ron grinned back briefly in spite of himself, but the serious look quickly returned. "Look — that's all fine and good and all, and I'm okay with you going about things the way you… usually do. Whatever that is. But we still have to think practically here," he pointed out in an urgent tone. "We have a limited amount of time to stop him. If we'd come back further, I'd say we had maybe a year at the outside. At this point, the best we can hope for is about half that time, probably less. You picked this year because it's the year he's your age, but he'll also be making his first Horcrux by the end of the year if everything runs its course." Ron looked intently at her, as if willing her to agree with him. "We have to set a time limit."

"A time limit," Luna echoed faintly. This side of things hadn't occurred to her; she had been thinking of Riddle as a slow-moving, continually unfolding relationship that she would form over a lifetime, not a series of events that she had to race the clock to derail before they hit their mark and made him irreversibly evil. Almost without being aware of it, she reached her hands up to tangle in her hair, a childhood habit of hers whenever things had become too much for her. These days, almost nothing was too much for Luna, but she found herself appreciating the comfort of the old gesture.

"Yes," Ron said firmly. "Six months. You have six months to get the psycho to change his ways and decide not to be Voldemort. After that, we give him up as a lost cause and I get rid of him. Agreed?" He held out a hand.

"Don't call him that," Luna said, her voice still quiet. "It's not kind."

Ron had the grace to look a little embarrassed. He did not, however, withdraw his hand.

"All right," she said at last, and shook his hand. "I'll do it in six months."

"Or I'll kill him," Ron repeated lightly, in what appeared to be a halfway-aborted attempt at a poor joke. Luna released his hand as if burned.

She looked at him mournfully, her silvery eyes wide. "I wish you weren't so accepting of that idea, Ron."

He paused, and then said in a slightly more subdued tone, "Me too, sometimes, but somebody's got to be."

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Luna was reflecting on this later in the day, as she sat on the hill where the Whomping Willow would one day be planted and watched the sea of long grass ripple steadily back and forth. Grey, puffy clouds were scudding across the sky over the castle; it looked like one of the last of the summer storms was on its way.

She didn't know what to make of what Ron had said. The two of them had eaten their breakfast in slightly uncomfortable silence, and Ron had sat with her until she'd finished, unwilling, despite the awkward atmosphere, to leave her to eat alone. This, more than anything, demonstrated to her Ron's fundamental personal duality, a conflict of character that she was absolutely incapable of understanding.

Ron was not a selfish person, and had proved this on a number of occasions, both in her presence and through what she had heard from others (mostly Ginny, but occasionally Hermione as well). Although he could at times be thoughtless or less than sensitive, he was at heart a deeply caring and kind person. His aura (or what little she could see of it at the moment) was warmly coloured and impressively stable, despite his tendency toward sudden, often plainly irrational outbursts of emotion. Ron was strong-hearted, dependable, loyal, and compassionate — an excellent friend, in short.

So _how_ could he so easily entertain the idea of killing someone else?

Luna pulled at her hair, feeling slightly despondent. The problem wasn't tormenting her soul, but it had been bothering at her mind for ages, like a particularly persistent Scythian Ring-Gnat.

She just didn't comprehend it. Fred had been killed, Harry Potter had been killed — _Daddy_ had been killed because somebody else didn't see a problem with killing. Probably they had thought about it much the same cavalier fashion that Ron appeared to, although admittedly he didn't seem quite so gung-ho about it as Ginny had evidently been.

A loud crack of thunder rumbled a little ways away, and Luna shifted where she sat, briefly considering going back to the castle before getting distracted by her thoughts again.

Maybe Ron would say that killing was only okay in certain kinds of circumstances, like this one. Or for certain people. But where did it stop? Who was supposed to decide that sort of thing? Did you kill all murderers, sociopaths and jealous spouses alike? Did you kill rapists, violent boyfriends and girlfriends, muggers on the street? Snatchers? Corrupt Aurors? Cowardly Ministers who failed to serve the people and instead served only themselves? All of those people had done, in her eyes, immeasurable wrong, although in drastically varied ways.

But if you were to murder all those people because they deserved it, it was still murder. Would someone else then take on the task of murdering you in kind?

She supposed that was, at least on the surface, the purpose of the law. Luna knew better than most, however, that the law could be twisted to evil ends, when those who understood it well enough chose to utilise it as such. But in any case, even if the Ministry of her own time had not been so thoroughly infiltrated by Voldemort's forces, the law of the present had no place in the past. Most of Voldemort's crimes as a Dark Wizard had not been committed yet, and those that had had left behind little evidence of his involvement. She didn't think bringing forward evidence obtained in the future, against a citizen of the past, constituted due process. It seemed somehow deeply unfair, although she was certain many of her friends would have argued with that idea.

It was true that if her efforts to stop Riddle from becoming Voldemort failed, she could see no way around the problem of having to murder him. Now that she was here and had the power to change things, she could not stand by and allow him to grow up to kill everyone she loved, as he inevitably would if things in the future continued to progress as they had.

Luna watched as the sun, wheeling high overhead, was slowly blanketed in clouds. She felt the first raindrop hit the top of her head and was halfway back to the castle when the rain began to intensify and, after a moment, came down in heavy sheets. She reached the entrance and stood outside for a moment longer, feeling the cold chill of the water as it ran through her hair, down the back of her neck, and into her shoes.

She thought, feeling somehow hollow in a way she never had before, that it was like tears.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Luna spent the rest of the day in a kind of exhausted daze, unable to focus on anything, not even her usual variety of distracted, disinterested musings and dreamy half-thoughts. Her face, which normally looked in its resting state as if she'd just been caught in a state of mild surprise, felt slack and leaden, and her footsteps fell rather more loudly than usual as she aimlessly wandered the hallways of the school which she had come to know as a second home, taking care to avoid any professors that she saw walking about the castle. She went to bed early without eating, in the hopes that a few extra hours of sleep would bolster her spirits the following morning.

As it turned out, they did. She still had no clear answer to the question of how to handle Riddle if she were to fail in her mission, but the light of day made this obstacle seem much less looming and insurmountable. Ron was not in the Great Hall when she arrived there for breakfast, wearing a mustard-coloured, star-patterned skirt and a sky-blue tee with a slowly moving image of a Crumple-Horned Snorkack carefully spelled into it. She ate without him.

Ron caught her on her way out of the castle; he'd been zooming about in the air on a spare broomstick, evidently practising his flying in case he decided to go out for Quidditch for the year, and nearly crash-landed on the ground in front of her in his effort to intercept her. "Hey, Luna," he said, sounding rather more cheery than usual as he stumbled off his broomstick and strode toward her; it seemed the exercise had relaxed him somewhat, and the ever-present tension that had been flitting around in his aura of late was much reduced.

"Good afternoon, Ron," she answered back, smiling vaguely. "I didn't interrupt your practising, did I?"

He laughed. "Oh — don't worry about that, I should be thanking you. This thing's got the handling of a barge and the speed of a kappa in the desert… I reckon school brooms never really change, do they? Maybe this fellow's still sitting in a cupboard somewhere, back in our time, waiting for some poor soul to pull him out again." He stood there grinning at her and waiting for a response, and when her placid expression did not change, Ron leaned back and scrutinised her for a moment. "So… you're not angry with me or anything, right?"

Luna was briefly taken aback, and quickly ran through their interactions over the past two days in her mind. _Did I seem unhappy with him?_ "Why would I be angry?" she inquired with sincere confusion. It was true, she wasn't exactly _glad_ about the reason he was there with her, but it was nice to have a friend along and it certainly hadn't upset her enough to make her hold a grudge.

Ron half-shrugged, looking equally bemused. "I just reckoned you might have… well, never mind that. Dumbledore wants to see you, to confirm all your class registrations and all that. He's in his office," he added. "Went to speak with him earlier myself… glad I got it over with first, to be honest. Dumbledore's… er, always put me on edge a bit." He seemed a little self-conscious about admitting this, but Luna thought it perfectly understandable. She'd never been intimidated by Albus Dumbledore, but it was easy to see how those piercing eyes could induce a sense of unease in some people. Ron was probably a tad over-awed with him, as he had come from a wizarding family where Dumbledore was often talked about and likely somewhat intertwined with the family lore, as a kind of mythical figure children were raised to look up to. Luna had of course heard of Dumbledore before entering Hogwarts, but the extent of his larger-than-life reputation had not become clear to her until a year or so after she met him personally.

She was tempted to ask him about some of this, but she was reluctant to leave Professor Dumbledore waiting, especially after he had done so much to help the two of them already. So she merely said, "Thank you, Ron. I'll see you later," turned on her heel, and left.

Dumbledore was sitting in his office when she arrived, looking over what appeared to be something rather important, and Luna hovered by the doorway briefly, watching Fawkes preen its brilliant red and gold feathers. The office's other occupant, however, quickly noticed her presence and looked up, and Luna drifted inside, leaving the door ajar.

"Ah, Miss Lovegood," he said in a mild tone. "Good day. I presume Mr. Granger told you why I asked to see you."

Luna nodded and conjured a chair with a wave of her wand, seating herself in front of the massive dark-wooded desk.

"I thought you might like to know, first off, that the official story on you two is that you are transfer students, formerly home-taught," Dumbledore informed her. "Professor Dippet may wish to meet with you both personally. I can't say for sure when that might be, but I'd advise you to prepare some things to say in advance — why you came to the school, and so on." When he saw Luna's answering nod, he then shuffled around his desk for a moment before coming up with a sheaf of parchments which he placed in front of him. "Now, normally this sort of thing, late registration and such, would be dealt with by your Head of House. However, given your… special circumstances… I suggested to Horace that he take the day off and let me handle your course selection process." He looked at her, his blue eyes bright and calm, and gave her a small, warm smile.

Luna noted, feeling a rush of affection toward Professor Dumbledore, that it seemed his beautiful, starry aura had never faded between 1943 and the first day she had met him as a twelve-year-old.

Then she blinked. "Would that be Horace Slughorn, Professor?"

He nodded. "The same. I assume you and perhaps Mr. Granger have met him — will meet him at some point in the future?" Then he paused and murmured in a quieter voice, "Or did he happen to fall victim to Lord Voldemort's machinations, during your war?"

"No, he's quite all right," Luna assured him, "at least he was when we left. He's back teaching here, actually. He seemed to be quite enjoying himself, too, until the Death Eaters started infiltrating the school."

Dumbledore paused. "Death Eaters," he repeated, his eyes straying to the side as he considered the implications of the term.

"Yes, Voldemort's followers," said Luna, imagining that she sounded a little calmer than she felt as the avalanche of traumatic memories associated with the phrase briefly threatened to smother her. She found her gaze straying to where Fawkes sat quietly in the corner, watching her with interest. Feeling a little bolstered by the trusting look in its black eyes, she went on, "His great mission… well, his obsession really, was always to be the final victor over death. Just like in the Tale of the Three Brothers, you know, from Beedle the Bard." She waited a moment and took a long, slightly trembling breath, letting the information sink in, before she added, "In the past year or so we discovered he was searching for the Deathly Hallows themselves, actually."

At this Dumbledore's eyes flicked to hers immediately, but he did not seem to focus on her, instead looking as though he was staring through her at some vivid and brightly-coloured memory long past. "Indeed?" he murmured distantly. "How fascinating. I suppose… given what I know of Tom… that this does not surprise me. He was sorted into Slytherin for a more compelling reason than most, it seems."

After a slight pause, the professor blinked and seemed to return to himself, shaking his ginger head. "But I digress. Have you considered yet which courses you plan to take this year? I must tell you, you'll likely be required to take a competency test in order to be placed in some of the more advanced courses, but I imagine you'll have little difficulty in that area, being a former Ravenclaw."

The phrase "former Ravenclaw" rankled a little — she wasn't _totally_ bereft of house pride — but Luna supposed that her house placement had never been all that important to her, at least not after the end of her first year. She'd had one or two friendly acquaintances in Ravenclaw, but as it turned out most of her friends ended up being Gryffindors. Her once-firm loyalty to Ravenclaw had shifted slowly over time to include the school in general, and by the end of it houses had barely mattered anyway… unless you were a Slytherin, of course.

"That sounds fine," affirmed Luna calmly, looking over the course list before her. "I doubt I'll want to be in all the same courses as… _him_ , but it probably wouldn't hurt to have more than a few. Just not so many that it might seem conspicuous." She met Dumbledore's eyes again for a moment and he nodded in agreement.

"Tom," he said, stroking his beard in thought, "is taking… let me see." He checked his own list. "Potions, naturally. Defence Against the Dark Arts… the irony of which does not escape either of us, I'm sure," he remarked dryly under his breath. "Arithmancy, Ancient Runes… Hm! Divination. That's curious." Dumbledore squinted at the parchment briefly. "Although for one as deeply paranoid as he is… I suppose it is unsurprising that he should wish to keep an eye on future events. And — Advanced Transfiguration." A dark brow rose. "I must be honest, I didn't expect him to go on with my classes for longer than he absolutely had to. But he must have his own reasons, I suppose." As he had seemed to be muttering half to himself, Luna was faintly startled when he abruptly looked up at her. "What do you think, Miss Lovegood?" he asked.

She tapped her chin with a finger. "I think… Arithmancy and Divination, definitely… I'm not sure about Defence Against the Dark Arts, as that seems like a bit of a waste, but maybe…" Luna fell silent, pondering. Charms and Defence against the Dark Arts were her strongest subjects, with Care of Magical Creatures at a close second (she was typically more interested in researching magical animals than actually handling them at close quarters, but at Hogwarts it was the best she was able to manage). She'd always been fairly poor with Potions, due to her proclivity for drifting off into inattention for long periods of time and letting her work turn to ruin in front of her; Luna had never been bothered by this, as she found the subject uninteresting and wasn't as concerned about poor marks as some of her housemates, but in this circumstance it was certainly inconvenient. She'd taken one course in Ancient Runes, and hadn't been quite as enthused about it as Hermione had, but it had at times been interesting. As for Transfiguration — well, that one could swing either way, as her spells in that area tended to be a bit hit or miss.

When she opened her mouth again, Luna had made her decision. "All right… yes," she murmured, then took a breath. "Arithmancy, Divination, Defence Against the Dark Arts… Charms, Care of Magical Creatures. And Transfiguration." She skated a few fingers back and forth along the side of her chair as she watched Dumbledore, waiting for his response.

"I'm sure I need not caution you against the potential risks of taking a class I am teaching," the professor commented, his keen eyes meeting hers. "If Tom were to sense any sort of association between the two of us, your chances of success would almost certainly be — if I may use the term — shot." He folded his hands on the desk. "You may trust my ability to keep my own counsel in that regard, but whether you feel you can safely do the same is a question only you can answer."

Luna's lips quirked as she considered this. "That's true." After a moment she shook her head, a tiny smile lighting her face. "I don't think it will be a problem, though. It's not as though I'll have to lie… just avoid saying anything about how we know each other."

Dumbledore nodded, apparently satisfied. "Very well, then. Might I schedule your competency examinations for tomorrow morning, or would you prefer a day or two to prepare?" He took Riddle's schedule and the course list in hand and straightened them before placing them to the side.

"Tomorrow morning sounds all right," Luna confirmed, rising and Vanishing her chair again before smiling cheerfully at Professor Dumbledore. "Thank you so much for your help, Professor. I'm sure all of this would be much more difficult without you."

His answering smile was kind. "It's no trouble, Miss Lovegood," he replied quietly. "but you are very welcome."

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

The next day Luna rose slightly earlier, dressed quickly (rose-pink blouse, burgundy trousers, beetle earrings, lucky hare bracelet) and only stopped by the Great Hall to grab an apple before she made her way to the Room of Requirement, where Professor Dumbledore would be waiting. He'd also sent Fawkes to show her the way there, although Luna promptly informed the bird that she knew where she was going and spent the brief trip chatting softly with it about things she thought might interest a phoenix, while the familiar rested silently on her outstretched arm and listened.

Luna was informing Fawkes of the health benefits of applying Flobberworm mucus to the skin around the talons when the familiar, beautifully elaborate door came into view. "Here we are," she interrupted herself serenely, and glanced at her companion, who was now looking at the door — presumably pleased to be back in the presence of its master. As soon as she turned the knob and pulled, Fawkes spread its wings and soared over to where Dumbledore waited next to a long wooden table. On the table rested a variety of magical objects, some of which were unfamiliar to Luna; she assumed the Room of Requirement had, as per usual, provided rather more options for the required task than were strictly necessary. It seemed the Room's eagerness to please had been unchanging through the years. Luna was unable to hide the smile that touched her lips at the thought.

Professor Dumbledore, with Fawkes faithfully at his shoulder, first led her through a series of rather rudimentary magical questions and exercises which then began to steadily advance in difficulty. _Unlock this lockbox without the use of an Unlocking Charm. Transfigure the water in this bowl into a garter snake. Now turn it back. Show me the correct method of dispatching a Boggart. Use tea leaves to determine the probability of tomorrow's weather being fair. Now use Rutger's Formula to do the same. Please demonstrate the proper method of handling a shrunken Moke. List the eight magical properties of the number seven. Please produce, to the best of your ability, a fully formed Patronus Charm. Select from the following items which would most effectively calm an agitated Bowtruckle._

The tests went on a long time, stretching out an hour or two longer than Luna had expected. Still, she did her best to concentrate and managed to complete most of the tasks set before her without much difficulty, although on one or two of them near the end she had to admit her lack of knowledge and take a pass.

Finally, Dumbledore replaced the bottle she had just Vanished water from on the table and smiled at her. "I believe that will be sufficient," he said simply. Luna, who had been fiddling with her wand in preparation for the next task, tucked it behind her ear.

"How was I?" she inquired, curious in spite of herself. She typically lacked interest in her own examination results, but she had never been tested by Dumbledore himself before and was hoping that he had not been disappointed.

"You performed quite admirably, actually. Most students of your age have no knowledge of advanced Charms magic such as Patronus charms… and your grasp of offensive magic appears to be very strong, as well." A faint crease appeared between his brows. "I must say, although your experiences — at least in regards to Lord Voldemort's part in them — have clearly been tragic, you have come out of them with an excellent understanding of practical spell application and a near-flawless technique."

Luna's mouth turned up. "Thank you," she said, with a glance at Fawkes, who looked (she thought) equally pleased although a little weary. "Is that all, then? Can I take all my classes?"

Dumbledore nodded. "You met or exceeded the requirements in every category, so yes, I should say so. Take the rest of the day to relax, why don't you? You've done well, Miss Lovegood."

At this last Luna's smile grew infinitesimally, and she felt a small, yellow flower of happiness bloom in her chest. _He thinks I did well._

"Oh, and let Mr. Granger know I'd like to see him," added Dumbledore as an afterthought, but Luna was barely listening.

"Thank you, Professor," she said again, and added to Fawkes, "and thank you for the company earlier." With a last bright grin at them both, she turned and left the Room of Requirement, heading for the woods outside.

After she was gone, Albus Dumbledore turned to his familiar and looked searchingly into its eyes for a moment before sighing heavily. "Yes, I know," he said. "I've grown rather fond of her, too."

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

A/N: Thanks again for reading! Please leave a comment if you have any thoughts, I'd love to hear from my readers :) Expect the next update in a week or so! xo shai


	6. Chapter Six

Recommended soundtrack for this chapter: "Electric Blue" by Arcade Fire, "Knight Of Noir" by Susanne Sundfør

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 **Chapter Six**

Later that afternoon, Luna wandered into the Forbidden Forest to spend some time with the spectral creatures known as Thestrals. As she was now totally unfamiliar to them, it was sort of half-disappointing and half-gratifying to go through the process of earning their trust from scratch all over again, and she went through about four pounds of meat (scavenged from the kitchens with the help of some of the house-elves, all of whom grew almost heartbreakingly eager to please as soon as she opened her mouth and spoke politely to them, and who listened with interest to her briefly waxing poetic on the eminence of pudding as the queen of foods) before she was finally able to get near the runt of the lot, a skittish little grey thing with bulbous eyes which was always pattering around to stand behind its mother, unaccustomed as it was to having anybody or anything that was not a Thestral look directly at it. By the time it had grown used to her presence and was allowing her to gently pat its head, the sky was beginning to darken and Luna turned back towards the castle with a sigh, before abruptly remembering what Dumbledore had said toward the end of their meeting.

 _Oops._ Luna briefly considered sending a Patronus to inform Ron of Dumbledore's message, but that would likely raise questions if a teacher were to notice the little silver hare on its way to find him, as a Patronus Charm was far beyond the capabilities of any normal student and would draw too much attention to her. She instead broke into an uneven run, heedless of the protruding roots that occasionally threatened to send her sprawling onto the forest floor.

After several minutes, Luna began to grow more anxious. Her breath was coming hard and her throat felt dry as a bone, and she had noticed a stitch in her side that was beginning to trouble her. She hadn't thought she'd gone that far into the forest, but then again it evidently extended somewhat farther into the grounds than she remembered.

At last she saw the edge of the forest and redoubled her speed as the castle came into view. In one of the open windows, a flash of red hair caught her eye, and Luna cried as loudly as she could, " _Ron!_ "

Ron turned to peer outside and noticed her jogging toward the castle. "Luna?" he answered back in a slightly befuddled yell.

"Yes, sorry," Luna shouted back. "There's something I forgot to tell you!"

"What?" bellowed Ron, a little more loudly, and rose in the frame of the window abruptly as he stepped up close to the narrow stone wall and rested his knee on the windowsill, leaning out slightly to hear her better. As he did so, his other foot seemed somehow to lose its purchase on the stone steps; Ron, sensing his loss of balance, overcorrected backwards, his hands scrabbling for the sill and pushing off so that his entire frame jerked suddenly away.

The events of the next few seconds seemed to occur in slow motion.

Luna saw him stumble as both of his feet hit the stone steps behind the window and he regained his balance. At the same time, she saw a small, round object tumble from his breast pocket and hurtle — almostslowly, with a kind of bizarre laziness that struck Luna, in the unfrozen back corners of her mind, as funny — towards the ground.

As she would reflect with some irony later, in that moment the only thought that registered in her mind with any clarity at all was _There's no time._

Luna watched, frozen, hand half-grasping her wand, as the object landed with a small cracking noise on the stone below. Her eyes flicked back up to Ron automatically, although she already knew with horrible certainty what would inevitably happen next.

He, with an almost comical expression of surprise, looked at the ground, and then back at Luna. In an instant, his expression changed to one of single-minded, white-faced resolve.

"Luna, I'll — " he started to say, and then was suddenly gone from the window.

She was running before she even understood what she was doing, sprinting for the place beneath the window where the object had fallen, ignoring the burning dryness of her throat and the stitch in her side and her painfully pounding heartbeat. A continuous chant was running through her mind, _no-no-no-no-no-no-no-no-no_ , and she realised vaguely that at some point her lips and throat had involuntarily begun to voice the words aloud. Her pale eyes were unblinking as she ran, frozen so wide open that they were beginning to water with discomfort.

Luna reached the spot beneath the window and nearly collapsed, her chest heaving and her hair stuck uncomfortably to the back of her sweat-covered neck.

She looked down and, with a soft, broken sound of fury and despair, laid eyes on the shattered remains of a bezoar.

Whether it was by her own foolishness, or Ron's carelessness, or simply by the pure and terrible chance of a ridiculous accident… to Luna, it hardly mattered. There was only one thing now that she knew to be true, one reality that had bloomed in front of her eyes like a hideous and many-petaled flower and was now staring her in the face.

She was now completely and unequivocally alone.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Back in 1998, the students of Hogwarts had managed to fight off Voldemort's forces once more, and Luna and Ron's determined pursuit of their mission had raised morale enough that everyone seemed to be holding up a little better, although those who had been on the front lines had been injured more severely than the last time; with the singular exception of Ginny, nearly all of the Weasley siblings who had survived the first attack were now in hospital, although Molly and Arthur seemed to be nearing full enough recovery to rejoin the fight. Meanwhile, Hermione, Ginny and Neville were not prepared to take Luna and Ron's success for granted and were refocusing on trying to defeat Voldemort themselves with the resources available. Given the somewhat restrictive nature of basilisk fangs, swords and Fiendfyre — the first two of which required close combat to utilise, and the latter of which all were reluctant to try given its infamous unpredictability — they were now hoping to find other options.

Hermione was in the library with Neville, researching this topic, when Ginny bolted white-faced into the room looking as though she'd seen a ghost.

"Ron," said Ginny. "Hermione, Ron. I saw him in the corridor, just now. He was there and then — and then he wasn't."

Hermione rose from her chair in alarm. "What?"

Neville looked between the both of them. "… Hermione? What's going on?"

Hermione had grown tight-lipped and pale. "If Ron was… here and then wasn't, it means something happened to his bezoar."

"Couldn't he have just said the counterspell?" prompted Ginny breathlessly, but Neville was shaking his head.

"I don't think that's how the counterspell was supposed to work," he murmured. "I didn't understand some of the theoretical bits, but saying the counterspell was supposed to bring them back… you know, normally. To stay."

"Neville's right," confirmed Hermione. "My first guess would be that Ron's temporal stability has been compromised, which would imply — like I said — he's somehow damaged or lost his bezoar. If that's the case, his cellular temporal affiliation would draw him back to this time, but without the counterspell he has no anchor."

Ginny grimaced. "So he's… floating."

Hermione nodded, looking disturbed. "Let's not take too much time to think about what this means. We can talk to him when we've anchored him properly in this time."

Over the next week, Ron appeared in the castle three times — once two days after Ginny had first seen him in the corridor, and twice two days after that. On his third appearance Ginny and Neville were both present, and Hermione was at last summoned in time and managed to perform the proper counterspell to stabilise his temporal anchoring.

Ron, when he was finally rescued, swayed and nearly fell to the floor in exhaustion before Neville caught him. "I'll tell you," he managed, speaking to all three of them, "that time travel stuff… really takes a lot out of a bloke. Think I need to… sleep for a week." He then slumped against Neville's shoulder and promptly collapsed.

Ron, tucked safely into bed in the Hospital Wing (which was now shelled over with more defensive spells than the Ministry and dangerously close to full), slept for nineteen hours before he finally awoke to find Hermione sitting at his bedside.

"Hey," he said softly, touching her hand.

Hermione, who had been dozing slightly, started awake and intertwined her fingers with his. "Ron!"

"Morning," he replied with a grin. "Or — is it?" His brow furrowed. "Sort of hard to tell, all the clouds over the sky these days and all."

"It's mid-afternoon," Hermione said softly. "You've been sleeping a while."

Ron was silent for a moment. "Doesn't seem like… much has changed. I suppose that means we failed."

"We don't know that," Hermione pointed out. "No use jumping to conclusions, Ron. Time magic is totally unpredictable. It might not have worked yet because you're here now and… you haven't killed Voldemort yet, have you?"

Ron shook his head, lips twisting slightly at the reminder. He wasn't as eager to do it as Ginny was, but the idea of having to go back in time again and finish the job because he hadn't managed it the first time round was extremely unappealing.

"What's that you were saying?" he asked a little absently. "I haven't gone back yet and done it, you mean? … So if I do… maybe the changes'll take effect?"

Hermione nodded tiredly, a wan smile fixed on her lips. "That's what I'm thinking, anyway. At this point, you still have the option of not going back. So the present determined by your past actions is still undefined."

"Gotta go back, then," Ron muttered in a resigned tone. He met Hermione's eyes then, looking just as exhausted as she was. "Luna and I… set a time limit. For her bit. Six months, and if she didn't have him on a better track by then, we agreed I'd do it. Do you think I could… go back a bit later?"

Hermione nodded, her eyes somber. "It's a shame," she whispered. "Part of me… sort of hoped she could really do it. But I suppose if you're here and nothing's different, she can't have succeeded."

Ron processed this quietly for a moment, his eyes wandering about the infirmary. "Yeah," he said finally. "That would have been ideal."

Hermione's lips turned down. "I still don't want you to do it, you know," she said softly. "No matter why you're doing it… it'll hurt you. I don't want that for you, Ron."

"I've got to, Hermione," he reminded her, looking nevertheless deeply troubled. "Luna won't do it. And even if she would, I'm not sure she'd be able to."

The brown-haired girl's mouth quirked. "I don't know. She's not as… soft as she used to be." This observation was made distantly, sadly, as if she had just read the end of a tragic story and didn't particularly feel like talking about it. After a moment Hermione shook her head and squeezed Ron's hand. "Anyway… let's not talk about it right now. You need to rest before you can think about going back. If and when you feel ready… I'll send you back to the six-month mark, and you can do it then."

"Okay," Ron said in a slow exhale, and squeezed her hand back before releasing it and turning over so that his back was to her.

Hermione rose slowly and made her way back to the library.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Dumbledore sat back, blue eyes flashing. "What do you mean, Mr. Granger is _gone_?" he inquired sharply. "Did something happen?"

Luna shook her head miserably, an almost involuntary movement that was not a reply so much as an expression of frustration. "Yes. His temporal anchor was broken." She pulled her bezoar out of her shoe and held it up for him to see. "We were using these."

For a moment, Dumbledore was distracted from his consternation enough to look with genuine interest at the bezoar. "Very… clever idea, Miss Lovegood, using a demimagical substance for an anchor. Did you enchant them yourselves as well?" Before Luna could open her mouth to reply, however, he had himself back to task. "But that's beside the point. Do you know if he will be able to return to this time, or might I begin formulating a sufficiently distracting cover story?"

Luna thought about this for a minute. "I… don't think he will try to come straight back and get here before term starts. We set a six-month time limit on my side of things." She looked up. "My guess would be that he'll try to return around then, if he decides to at all. He was technically supposed to be my backup, but he knows I can take care of myself when need be. And it's not as though Hogwarts is especially dangerous… these days." Luna fell silent, her expression bland but with an echo of pain behind it.

"I see." Dumbledore looked equally troubled. "Well… I shall make his excuses to the other professors, of course, although his name should be kept on the registry so that he has some reason to be here in the event of his return. Are you sure you'll be all right by yourself, Miss Lovegood?"

Luna tried to smile and failed, accomplishing only a slight twitching of lips which quickly faded back into her former despondent expression.

"I'm certain I'll manage perfectly well on my own," she said. It was not exactly a lie; she had been unthinkingly independent for many years of her life, as friends had never offered themselves as an option until she was fourteen. But she had since then grown used to their presence, and suddenly having to be alone again reminded her unpleasantly of her three-month stay in the dungeons of Malfoy Manor. At the thought she felt her heart wrench suddenly and realised that she missed Harry desperately. What a joy it had been to see his face, that day he'd shown up out of the blue and rescued her.

None of these thoughts or emotions made it onto her face, but Dumbledore seemed to observe them anyway, watching her calmly but for the concerned light in his eyes. "If you should require assistance of any kind, Miss Lovegood," he said gently, "I trust you know that you need only ask."

Luna nodded and tried to smile again, succeeding a little more this time. She stood, Vanished her chair with her usual vague gesture, and walked out of his office.

That night, she slept poorly, and dreamed of her dead friends, and of snakes that twined themselves about her arms and legs until she was no longer able to move to save anybody.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

A/N: Yeah, so... that happened. I know a lot of you were excited to see how Ron would handle things, and I would have loved to keep him around for a bit longer, but he just wouldn't cooperate. Looks like Luna's on her own for now.

Thanks again for sticking with me, and please leave comments if you have any thoughts on the story so far. :) Look for the next chapter in a week or so! Somebody special might finally decide to make an appearance... xo shai


	7. Chapter Seven

Recommended soundtrack for this chapter: "Deep Green" by Marika Hackman, "Serpents" by Sharon Van Etten

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 **Chapter Seven**

The following morning, Luna woke before dawn and dressed in her uniform and robes. She had been planning on sleeping in as long as possible, seeing as the other students would not be arriving until evening, but a particularly nasty nightmare had jolted her awake and she hadn't really had the courage to go back to sleep after that.

She stopped by the Great Hall briefly, but as it was empty and the house-elves were evidently still asleep, she decided not to bother them. Instead, she obtained permission from Dumbledore (who was also awake) to go up to Gryffindor Tower and collect Ron's things from the boys' dormitory. By the time she had managed to squeeze his trunk back into Hermione's bag — she could have used magic to shrink it, but oddly felt like doing it the hard way — it was nearly noon, and she returned to the Great Hall to have some lunch. When she saw that the elves had provided her with pudding, she was unable to stop the smile that touched her face.

After she finished eating, Luna still had several hours to kill until the Sorting Feast, and her normally cool head was uncharacteristically buzzing with nerves. She thought she might have a few Wrackspurts, but she'd forgotten her Spectrespecs at home before returning for sixth year, and her normal enhanced perception of elusive magical creatures had remained significantly diminished since her arrival in 1943.

To calm herself, she ventured once again into the Forbidden Forest, running her hands carefully over leaves and twigs, and missing the feeling of earth under her feet. The Thestrals had probably already been led out of the forest by the gamekeeper and would be getting harnessed to the carriages in an hour or so to drive out to Hogsmeade Station, so there was no chance of her getting any more time with them until tomorrow. Her mind somehow both cavernously empty and whirling with activity, Luna wandered the forest without paying much attention to where she was going. She came close to entering what Harry and Ron had told her was Aragog's territory and changed direction once she noticed, but in her absent meandering she did happen accidentally to stumble into another dangerous part of the forest, which she discovered when she stepped on a twig and heard the creaking noise of a bow being drawn.

"Those of my colony do not make a habit of harming young ones," said a deep voice to her left, "but the children at the castle have not yet arrived. Tell me why you are here, on our lands, without invitation."

Luna turned around to face a tall, handsome, long-haired centaur with bright dark eyes and a glossy black coat. He was pointing his arrow directly at her head, but lowered it instantly when he met her eyes. To Luna's surprise, she saw understanding light his gaze.

"Who are you?" he murmured in a quieter and far less hostile tone. "Are there not laws among your people, that those out of time should avoid being seen? Why are you here?"

"How do you know that I'm a time-traveller?" Luna inquired curiously, peering at him through her pale eyelashes. She noticed upon closer inspection that there was some silver in his hair, just above his long and pointed ears, and that his face was somewhat craggier than she had originally thought.

"We centaurs are known for our clear-sightedness," said the other, a little snobbishly. "The future makes itself known to us, playing out slowly in the stars and in the eddies of the air, in a way that it does not for your people." He squinted at her. "But you… around you it circles oddly in a way I have not seen before. The patterns are strange, unclear." Then he shook his head, and the mass of dark hair tumbled around his shoulders. "I have glimpsed one of your kind using one of your time-travelling devices, only once, but it was nothing like this."

Luna's eyes drifted away from him. "I am here for a purpose, although I wandered into your territory by accident." She glanced back to meet his gaze again. "I do apologise for that, sir — ?"

"Solarn," the centaur supplied, looking at her intently, his heavy eyebrows coming together. "Not 'sir.' Your infringement is pardoned."

"Thank you." She paused a moment, noting that what she could see of the sky, beyond the trees, was beginning to darken. "There is a boy in this time who will grow into a very powerful Dark Wizard. In about half a century, he will launch an attack on this castle. Many suffered — will suffer, because of him. Some of your people have been killed in the fighting, as well."

"We do not interfere in human affairs," retorted Solarn, disbelieving.

"You didn't, at first," said Luna, her voice soft. "Well, one of you did. Firenze. He was teaching at the school when the attacks took place. The rest of you didn't… come around… until after he was injured."

Solarn recoiled. "Firenze?" he demanded in a hiss. "Impossible. I do not believe it."

She looked at him, brows high. "Is he here now, in the forest?"

"We will not harm children, but you are not as young as most in the castle, and we do _not_ suffer liars," snarled the centaur, his arm tensing as he gripped the arrow in his hand. "You should leave, human."

"I'm sorry to have offended you," Luna said politely, hiding her mild annoyance, then bowed slightly — a gesture appreciated, although not often used, by centaurs — and took her leave, walking off in the direction she had come. It was time and past to be heading back to the castle anyway; she heard the faint sounds of the train in the distance, the rattling of the wheels on the tracks and the high, piercing whistle.

It was once again much later than she had anticipated when Luna at last exited the forest and arrived back at the castle. A steady stream of students was already forming between the carriages and the entrance to the school, and the first years looked to be about halfway across the lake, the lanterns of their boats reflecting brightly off the dark water. Luna made her way into the Great Hall and surveyed the turnout so far; all of the professors, including Professor Slughorn and Professor Dumbledore, were seated at the high table, save one empty seat at the end which Luna presumed was to be saved for whichever teacher had the duty of directing the first years into the Sorting Ceremony. A few unfamiliar faces caught her eye; there was a small, dark-skinned woman with a bright smile on her lips chatting with Professor Slughorn, a heavyset man with curly salt-and-pepper hair and spectacles who kept glancing at the entrance to the hall, and a cheerful-looking fellow with dimples and an uneven tan trading goblets with a willowy, gaunt-faced woman with blazing red hair. Armando Dippet, the elderly Headmaster, sat with an impressive kind of silent dignity (which, in Luna's eyes, nevertheless failed to match that of Dumbledore) at the centre of the table.

Luna cast an eye toward the Slytherin table, noting with some relief that only a few students were seated there, and they were clustered around one end of the table. In another time, she might perhaps have asked to sit with them, and tried her best to make friends. At this moment, however, Luna was feeling uncharacteristically raw and vulnerable without Ron's comforting presence nearby, and she did not feel up to introducing herself to people who would likely be inclined to mock her for many of her habits and beliefs. Heart in her throat, she quickly made for the other end of the table and sat down, ignoring the curious glances of the other students as they noticed her unfamiliar face. She barely looked up at all as the Great Hall filled with students, and kept her gaze trained on the table during the Sorting Ceremony, which — she saw from her sole glance toward the front during the whole process — was led by a slim, aquiline-nosed male professor with shoulder-length silver hair. A number of the surnames she heard over the course of the ceremony were familiar, but none of the first names were. Luna felt another pang of loss and then shook herself, trying to steel her nerves. This was not the time for drifting away in her emotions; no matter how she felt, she had to exert some control over her thoughts for once. Her mind was vast and nebulous, and she knew that it possessed the capacity for the same kind of intense, sharp concentration that Hermione demonstrated on a regular basis. She did her best to summon that singleminded focus, that clarity of thought which had come to her that night in the Department of Mysteries during the battle with the Death Eaters and had stayed at the back of her mind through all of Voldemort's attacks on the school. She came to attention just as the last student, a Malcolm Zellinger, was Sorted into Ravenclaw and Professor Dippet came forward to speak before the start of the feast. She saw him cast a muttered Sonorous Charm, wand at his throat, before he began.

"Hello again to you all," he said, and she could see why the charm had been necessary; his voice, even twenty-odd years before his death, was so weak that it was barely a whisper. "I don't wish to delay our supper very long, as I am sure you are all as famished as I am." His lips, hidden in his well-trimmed white beard, cracked in a brief smile, and some of the students laughed politely at the non-joke. Despite his relative lack of presence compared to her old Headmaster — who, ironically, was sitting mere feet away from where Dippet stood — there was warmth in his gaze as he looked out at the students, and Luna found herself likening him in her mind to the white-bearded Dumbledore of her memory.

"I am pleased to announce, however," Dippet was continuing, "that we have a new transfer student in our midst, joining Slytherin house for her sixth year of magical instruction — a Miss Luna Lovegood. If you'd stand, please, Miss Lovegood."

Luna did so and met Dippet's eyes with a brief nod. His eyes crinkled in an answering smile, and she sat back down as the Great Hall erupted into whispers and muttered reactions. She glanced around briefly and found that many of the Slytherins were looking at her. To her relief, she found that being the centre of attention did not bother her any more than it had ever done, and she was able to manage a small smile at those who made eye contact before turning back to Professor Dippet, who had just cleared his throat.

"Yes, yes, very glad to have you, I'm sure," he added abstractedly. "Now — I must make known to you all your student authorities for the coming year. Our Head Boy and Girl are — if each of you would stand, please — Sofia Hopkirk of Ravenclaw, and Abraxas Malfoy of Slytherin house." Luna looked up, recognising immediately the long white hair typical of the Malfoy line and the same angular hatchet-face that belonged to Lucius Malfoy and his son Draco. Sofia Hopkirk, the Head Girl, was looking over at him as well, a clear expression of dislike written on her elfin features. Dippet continued talking, and Malfoy sat immediately, looking bored. His counterpart hesitated briefly before following suit.

"The Gryffindor prefects are — " Dippet glanced down at a bit of parchment in front of him. "Zacharias Balser, Yancy Bulstrode, Heather Makepeace, Vivian Olstead, Everett Weasley, and Euphemia Crinsey-Abbott." Each of the prefects stood, and Luna's gaze lingered on the round-faced, quiet-looking boy with bright red hair who had been sitting next to the girl called Euphemia. His robes had a shabby quality to them, and looked rather too small for him, as he seemed to possess the same tall, slight build as Ron's father Arthur. She felt her heart twist looking at him and wondered if, now that Ron wasn't here, it might be safe to try and talk to him.

A hushed, annoyed whisper from the Ravenclaw table behind her drifted to her ears. "Why does he repeat them all every year?" an older female student was complaining. "It's not as though any of them would ever let us forget…"

"Slytherin prefects," Dippet went on, "excluding Mr. Malfoy, of course, are — let me see — " He squinted at the parchment again. "Walburga Black, Percival Nott, Cecily Harlowe, Edith Selwyn, and Tom Riddle."

At this Luna stopped listening and turned her attention toward the Slytherin table, where the last of the prefects was rising to join the other four. Dippet could not have timed it more dramatically if he'd tried.

Tom Riddle had been sitting about as close to the head of the table as it was possible to be, and a sort of bizarre court of Slytherin cronies had formed around where he sat, even though many of the students in it were obviously older than he was. Luna spared them hardly a glance, however, unable to stop her eyes from being drawn, almost magnetically, to the ruler himself.

Looking at him was a strange and disorienting experience. Luna had known, from a purely logical standpoint, that Tom Riddle was unlikely to have looked anything like Lord Voldemort in his school days. Persistently, however, whenever she had thought of "Riddle," what came to her mind was always that horribly pale, warped, serpentine nightmare of a face, and the tall, black-cloaked frame of what had once been an adult man. She had had no concept of his appearance as a sixteen-year-old, as nearly all photographic evidence of him that had remained in the school had been destroyed after his fall from power, mostly by angry students who had lost parents or other family to the Death Eaters.

The young man — boy, really — who was now standing in the Great Hall looked for all the world like an innocent, a victim, someone who might once have been the helpless target of a schoolyard bully. His face was not cruel or harsh-featured, but instead looked startlingly boyish, and had rather a gentle, unassuming quality to it. He was of moderate height and slender build, with pale skin, softly curving plush lips, a perfect snub nose, and long-lashed, sharply intelligent green eyes which — the thought rose unbidden to Luna's mind — would not have looked out of place on a particularly pretty girl. His appearance, it occurred to her after a moment, seemed to have long left behind the common and mundane descriptor of _strikingly handsome_ and was now dwelling comfortably in the realm of the uncannily beautiful. To Luna, it was both jarring and strangely fitting; she had known of his famous charm which he had used to expertly manipulate professors and students alike, and it made sense that part of this should come from his looks, although the realisation that he and the awful snake-man were the same person was still a shock to her.

He turned to mutter a word to one of his fellow prefects — Nott? — and as soon as his face moved, the image of gentleness vanished before her eyes. There was a distinct coldness to his manner, the way the expressions formed on his face, as if he had to pause to put on a mask. She could not hear his voice, but if it was anything like the one she remembered, it would likely give the same impression.

Abruptly his eyes moved to her, as he had apparently noticed her not-very-surreptitious stare. Luna felt an icy jolt in the pit of her stomach as a mix of horror, apprehension and fascinated curiosity shot through her. The green eyes narrowed slightly and the fine dark brows drew together as he regarded her, and Luna blinked and looked away, focusing on the table in front of her as Dippet continued listing off the prefects for the other houses.

"Um — hello," said the quiet voice of a girl to her right, and Luna gratefully turned toward her before realising that the girl was standing and looking up at her face. She had blonde hair a few shades off from Luna's own colour, and was rather pretty, in a bland sort of way.

"You're one of the prefects for Slytherin, aren't you?" said Luna in what she hoped was a friendly tone. The girl smiled at her.

"Yes, I'm Cecily. Harlowe," she added belatedly, still talking under Dippet. "You're Luna Lovegood, right? It's lovely to meet you. Slytherin hardly ever gets transfer students… not that we have very many here at Hogwarts to begin with…" she trailed off, obviously hoping that Luna would fill in the blanks about why she was there.

"My situation is a bit unique," said Luna simply, wondering how many lies she would have to tell to navigate this conversation. "I was home-schooled," lie, "but my father died recently, and my mother was killed in an accident years ago." This was true. "They were both Slytherins, so Professor Dippet agreed to put me in their house, since we both thought I'd fit in best here." The _most_ outrageous of lies, and it put a bad taste in Luna's mouth although it had slipped out easily. Any Lovegood, even her grandfather, would have been miserable in Slytherin. Her mother had apparently received a comment from the Hat about her impressive ambitions in the field of spell creation, but as it ultimately judged this to be an intellectual pursuit she was sent to Ravenclaw. Xenophilius, her father, had been a proud Hufflepuff.

"Oh, I'm so sorry," exclaimed Cecily, looking appropriately sympathetic. Dippet was apparently finished speaking and she sat down, along with the other prefects. "Well, not to worry. We Slytherins take care of our own. You're certain to find a home here." She patted Luna's hand comfortingly.

Inwardly, Luna was somewhat torn. The girl was blatantly artificial, obviously considering friendliness towards new students to be part of her duties as a prefect despite perhaps not being personally inclined to such shows of warmth. However, there was a certain quirkiness about her manner, lying beneath the glossy veneer of tepid cordiality, which resonated with Luna's own offbeat personality. Perhaps Cecily was just awkward, and had to hide her real reactions behind play-acting like this.

Whatever the case, Luna decided, it would be no use flatly rejecting a display of friendship. She smiled back at Cecily and thanked her. "It's lovely to meet someone so friendly straightaway," she added cannily, fixing her face with a vague smile. She noted that Cecily's touched expression faded into one of satisfaction rather more quickly than the other girl appeared to realise.

A moment later, the empty platters in front of them filled abruptly with food, and Luna helped herself to some roast duck and a generous helping of braised potatoes. As Cecily served herself, she leaned over and murmured, "I saw you looking at Riddle." Luna glanced at her, startled, but Cecily made a dismissive face. "You're definitely not alone," she said with a laugh. "He's gorgeous, isn't he? Slytherin's Golden Boy, the other houses call him. Top marks in every subject, and charming as can be." Her smile dimpled, then faded slightly. "I don't know, though. The way the others idolise him… it seems to me like they go a little overboard. It's a bit creepy, actually," she added as an afterthought.

"You have no idea," Luna muttered, a little louder than she meant to. What remained of Cecily's smile dropped off her face.

"Pardon?"

"Just talking to myself," Luna said airily. "Sorry, I do tend to do that sometimes."

"No problem at all," Cecily assured her, although she still looked faintly perturbed. "Um — do you know him? Riddle? Did you… live near him, or something?"

Luna raised her eyebrows and looked at Cecily, eyes wide. "What? No, I've never met him before." This was technically true; while Luna had certainly _seen_ Voldemort and heard his voice multiple times, she had never interacted directly with him herself, not even when she had been captured and imprisoned in the Malfoys' dungeon with Mr. Ollivander.

Cecily looked slightly more mollified at Luna's guileless expression, and turned her attention to her food briefly before speaking again. Luna took the opportunity to take a few bites of duck, although she found her appetite to be rather smaller than usual that evening.

"So — you said your parents were Slytherins?" Cecily went on after swallowing a mouthful of food.

"Yes," Luna replied, careful to avoid blinking or touching her hair or looking to the side or any other easy giveaway of a lie. She was usually able to tell when people were being disingenuous without relying on such obvious tricks, but she typically found that others were less perceptive and tended to accept small falsehoods easily as long as she wasn't too shifty during the actual act of lying. She rarely took advantage of this knowledge, finding intentional mistruth to be repugnant, but sometimes it was necessary, as now.

"I only ask because you seem the thoughtful sort. Dreamy types like you are usually happier in Ravenclaw." Cecily said this without any hint of suspicion, merely noting it as a point of interest. "I understand wanting to be in your parents' house, but… I've got to be honest, Slytherins can be a little meaner than the other houses sometimes. When somebody doesn't measure up, everybody gangs up on them and it isn't pretty." She frowned, looking concerned.

Luna realised that Cecily had abandoned the cheap and easy façade of friendliness in favour of an honest evaluation of Luna's circumstances, and was briefly touched. Cecily obviously couldn't have realised that Ravenclaw students were the ones who had actually given Luna the most trouble about her various oddities over the years, and that every house was more or less equal-opportunity in the area of bullying; nevertheless, Luna appreciated that Cecily could speak candidly about her house to a stranger, at least after she had ceased the painfully artificial welcome-committee routine and decided — likely on a whim — that Luna was someone worth looking after.

Luna favoured her new friend with a slow, bright smile. "I understand, and thank you. But believe me, Slytherin is where I should be."

Cecily shrugged. "If you say so. Just don't say I didn't warn you when the ones on _that_ end of the table start practising their jinxes on your pets." She jerked her head in Riddle's direction.

"Haven't got any pets," said Luna primly. "They don't really fit into my lifestyle very well."

The other girl shot her a look. "You know what I mean," but her dimples were showing again, and a moment later her hazel eyes crinkled in amusement. "You're a cool one, aren't you? Don't look the slightest bit nervous. Maybe you'll do all right in Slytherin after all."

Luna met her eyes with a grin, and both of them broke out in quiet laughter. Evidently her naturally reserved demeanour was paying off.

Without warning, Luna felt a sudden icy sensation go up her spine. As she looked at her plate, she imagined she could see long shadows coming up from behind her and reaching over the table. Her smile froze, then faded into what she hoped was a sufficiently bland expression.

"I trust you're making our newcomer feel at home, Cecily?" came a light, pleasant tenor from behind them.

x-x-x-x-x-x

A/N: Yes, it is exactly who you think. Things will start getting fun pretty soon, so be sure to stick around and leave a comment if you have one! xo shai


	8. Chapter Eight

Recommended soundtrack for this chapter: "Make It Holy" by The Staves

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

 **Chapter Eight**

"I trust you're making our newcomer feel at home, Cecily?" came a light, pleasant tenor from behind them.

Both girls turned around to face the intruder, none other than Riddle himself. He was smiling charmingly, but that ever-present coldness in his eyes chilled Luna to the core. She could not bring herself to summon an answering smile, and merely stared at him, wondering if the snake was somewhere inside him somehow. Maybe the pale, warped serpent's face was his real one, and was hiding underneath the beautiful mask even now, waiting to be revealed. Maybe he had really been Voldemort ever since he was a child, and Tom Riddle had been the falsehood.

Maybe doing this, coming here, had been a mistake. She should have stayed behind in the future and done all she could to help fight, instead of wasting time and resources on a silly pipe dream of saving a killer's soul…

 _No._ She thought of Harry. Harry would believe in Riddle's ability to be a real person, would believe in her ability to help him. Harry believed in everybody.

She realised vaguely that somebody was speaking, and with some effort turned her attention back towards the conversation.

"— parents were Slytherins," Cecily was saying. "Right?" She looked at Luna expectantly.

"Hmm? Oh — yes," said Luna belatedly, hoping she had understood correctly the direction the conversation had gone.

"You are pure-blood, then?" asked Riddle casually, in a tone of polite interest.

Luna's stomach rolled, but she forced herself to answer, "Yes." It wasn't a lie, but it was something she hated to acknowledge about herself; her parents had never taken pride in their nearly-spotless magical bloodlines, and the Lovegood family had no affiliation with Slytherin House whatsoever. Luna had never been raised to see it as something important, and as a matter of fact had developed something of an unconditional fondness for Muggle-borns when she had finally succeeded in befriending the indisputably brilliant and fiercely loyal Hermione.

Riddle was looking at her rather oddly. "Are you quite all right?" he said in a tone of what sounded to her like false concern, the perfect lips turning downward.

Unable to stop herself, Luna glared at him, then forced her eyes away and softened her expression. "I'm fine, thank you," she said after a moment, her voice even. "Just tired. I'm sure you must be as well. It's rather a long train ride, after all." She found the resolve to look at him again and schooled her expression into its usual wide-eyed blankness.

Riddle, however, was not fooled, and she saw his eyes flash with recognition of her lie, followed by mild amusement, and finally a look of dispassionate contempt — this last being so brief that if she hadn't known better, she might have thought she'd imagined it. A moment later, his face bore a sympathetic cast that reminded her rather horribly of Bellatrix Lestrange play-acting at being compassionate.

"If you find yourself needing to retire early," he said commiseratively, "I'm sure Miss Harlowe would be happy to show you to the girls' dormitory."

"Of course," Cecily put in agreeably with a glance at Luna.

Luna took a breath and steeled herself. "Was there a reason you came over to talk to us, Mister…?"

Now that she was paying attention, it was almost easy to catch the expression of irritation that flew across his features like an owl over the moon, before they settled into the former look of easy politeness.

"Riddle," he said amicably, "Tom Riddle. It's a pleasure to meet you, Miss Lovegood." He inclined his head slightly, and Luna wondered with some distaste if he was going to try to kiss her hand or whatever it was people did in the forties, but he made no move to do so, and after a moment she relaxed.

"Luna, please," drifted out of her mouth on instinct before she realised what she was saying. She wasn't sure which was worse — having the future Dark Lord address her by her first name, or the same surname which had belonged to her father, whom he'd killed… would kill.

Something at the end of the table caught Riddle's attention, and he turned back to Luna and Cecily with a slight frown. "I'm very sorry," he said a little distractedly, "but it seems I have some compatriots on the other end of the table who have been missing my presence. I merely wanted to greet Miss Lovegood — Luna," he amended with a disarming smile, and she suppressed a shudder, instantly regretting her request of a few moments ago, "and wish you both a good evening. Until later, Cecily, Luna." He nodded to the two of them and strode off to rejoin his cronies at the front of the Great Hall.

 _Merlin, I hope he doesn't keep calling me that._ Luna's lips twisted in distaste. There was something about the way he said her name that made it sound disgusting to her, despite his undeniably nice voice. Somehow she felt that being addressed as "Lovegood" would make her feel less violated. Less as if by uttering her name, he had somehow gained a kind of power over her. She hadn't expected simply hearing her own name from his lips to be this difficult. She hadn't expected _any_ of it to be this difficult. Just being within five feet of him made her feel cold, drained and weary, as if a heavy weight had been placed on her shoulders.

Somehow, Luna knew she would manage. She would do it — she would make him a person.

And then, afterward, she would get as far away from him as possible, and let him live out his human life in peace, without her in it. There was only so much a girl could manage in one lifetime, after all. Once it was over, she would have earned her own sweet solitude a hundred times over.

In the hazy background of her perception, she noted Cecily questioning her. "What?" Luna inquired distantly.

"I _said_ , why did you lie?" Cecily said, sounding impatient. "Not as though I have some sort of moral quandary with them in general, I'm a Slytherin — but most people do have some sort of _reason_ behind lying to a boy they claim they've just met for the first time?" This last assertion had the inflection of a question.

"I wasn't lying," said Luna blandly. "I really am tired."

Cecily's eyes were narrowed. "You weren't on the train here today. You've been here at least a day already. I saw you come into the castle, you didn't have any bags or a trunk or anything with you," she pointed out, her tone mildly accusatory.

Luna paused in the venture of taking a last bite of potatoes. "It doesn't matter," she said softly. "The real reason would… cause problems for me here. I'd prefer it if you didn't mention it again."

The other girl's scowl eased slightly. Finally, she sighed. "All right. If you say so, Luna."

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

It had not occurred to Luna that morning, despite the obvious logic of the conclusion, that today would be the day she would have to finally move into that wretched Slytherin dormitory. She had never moved any of her things into the dormitory at all, keeping everything tucked away in Hermione's moke-skin bag, which she carried with her at all times and which was now hanging at her side under her robe. In retrospect, she reflected, it probably would have been easy to have simply chosen a bed before the other students arrived and moved some of her things there so as to stake her claim, but the idea had never occurred to her. As it was, she would simply have to take whatever was left by the time she got to the dormitory.

Luna waited until Cecily was finished eating and then the two of them walked back to the Slytherin common room, which was full of exhausted-looking first years being herded into their dormitories by the two Slytherin prefects, Selwyn and Nott, who had evidently been assigned to guide them back to the common room. The common room was just as dark and impeccably furnished as it had been earlier that day, but Luna felt as though its atmosphere was somehow faintly heavier and less welcoming than it had been before, and it was making her uneasy. Cecily was over by one of the staircases leading down into their dormitory and suddenly seemed to notice that Luna had not accompanied her, because she turned back with a nonplussed expression and gestured aggressively for the other girl to follow. Eager to escape the unpleasant ambiance, even for the equally unpleasant character of the dormitory, Luna trotted after her and the two of them descended the steps together and then went through a little hallway before reaching their assigned dormitory.

Cecily pushed the door open and went inside without hesitation, although Luna lingered for a moment before following, still reluctant to subject herself to the flood of coldness and cloying bad intent that had filled her lungs and swamped her aura her last time she'd entered the dormitory; however, the air of the room seemed to have lightened a little since then, perhaps due to Cecily's bright and steady presence. Luna took a breath and went inside.

One girl, chubby and pale with thin brown hair and nervously fidgeting hands, was already there and sitting on one of the beds. She smiled briefly at Cecily and gave Luna a curious, not-unfriendly once-over. "Hi," she said.

"Carlotta," said Cecily, sounding significantly more aloof than she had when speaking to Luna, "this is Luna Lovegood. Luna, Carlotta Bulstrode."

"Hello there," said Luna, her eyes drifting around Carlotta as she examined the girl's weak rose-coloured aura.

"So, you're a transfer student?" said Carlotta, her dark eyes moving between Cecily and Luna.

"Mm-hmm," Luna replied, admiring the flashes of silver that were flickering around Carlotta's face and hands. Cecily was to their right, hovering between two of the beds in apparent indecision. Finally she flopped down on the one in the corner, and Luna — although she would have liked Carlotta's bed, as it was closest to the large window which looked out into the shadowy depths of the lake and gave the illusion of more space — took the one next to Cecily's.

The room was silent for a few moments as Carlotta wrung her hands and Cecily gave Luna a look that read, _is she weird or what?_ Luna looked away, remembering all too clearly what it was like to be the target of that kind of silent disdain. "It's nice to meet you, Carlotta," she said softly and a little defiantly. Cecily frowned briefly, but then shrugged and rolled over, kicking at her bedposts.

"It's nice to meet you, too," echoed Carlotta, but she was looking askance at Luna, evidently a little put off by her preoccupied and distant manner. Suddenly she looked up and smiled again. "Edith! Hello! How was your — oh — hi, Walburga," she finished, her momentarily vibrant tone shrivelling rapidly into bald-faced fear before going entirely silent. Luna turned to see who she was speaking to. Two girls were standing in the doorway.

One of them, the one Luna remembered as Edith Selwyn, was tall, willowy and sloe-eyed and bore a perfectly flat expression as she stared at the floor. The other was much smaller, with a mass of dark curls and blue eyes that looked nearly violet, and was looking at Carlotta with a positively frigid expression on her pretty face. After a moment the second girl turned to Cecily and said, "Hello, Cecily. Good holiday?" Her voice was cool, but her annoyance seemed to be directed more at Carlotta than at Cecily.

"Fine, Walburga," Cecily replied with a smile. "And you?"

"Good," Walburga clipped, then strode over to one of the empty beds and sat on it. Without saying a word, Edith drifted over to the last empty bed and seated herself as well. "My brothers and I went to France for the summer. I think there are more pure-blood witches and wizards there than there are here. Must be something in the water." Making a noise of disgust, Walburga fell backwards onto her pillow and took a breath before looking over at Luna. "You're the new girl, are you?"

"Yes," said Luna. "And you're Walburga Black?"

"The same," said Walburga sardonically. "I'm eldest of the Slytherin prefects, by the way, and _just_ so you know, I also would have been Head Girl this year if that old fool Dippet weren't so insistent on keeping a 'balance between the houses, Miss Black.'" She imitated Dippet's weak voice mockingly, ending with an elegant snort. "He's an absolute joke."

"At least you know it wasn't you," Carlotta ventured, twisting her hair between her fingers anxiously. "I mean — if it's Dippet's fault." She quailed under Walburga's answering glare.

"Try not being so _entirely_ useless sometime, Carlotta," the older girl snapped. "I don't need pity from _you,_ of all people."

"Don't bite her head off, Walburga," said a low, soft alto from the corner of the room; Luna realised after a moment that it had been Edith who had spoken, at last. Her tone was as flat as her expression. "She hasn't done anything wrong." Carlotta grinned at Edith shyly, looking grateful. Edith ignored her, except to glance briefly in her direction before turning her eyes back to Walburga.

To Luna's mild surprise, Walburga subsided at this, although she still looked annoyed. "I hope the old dullard dies in his sleep," she said merely, before her eyes met Luna's again. "You don't know anything about Dippet, I suppose?"

"Not really," Luna admitted.

"He's the _worst_ Headmaster in the history of this idiotic school."

"Don't let Riddle catch you saying that," said Carlotta suddenly, and for once Walburga's eyes were more perplexed than angry when they fell on the chubbier girl.

"Why? He thinks Dippet's ridiculous. He told me so."

"Not about Dippet. About Hogwarts being idiotic. He loves this place more than he loves his own mother, Walburga, you know that," Carlotta said promptly, her aura looking brighter than it had a minute ago. It seemed her trepidation about speaking to Walburga had faded upon Edith's intervention.

Walburga sighed and tossed an arm over her eyes. "I'll never understand why he worships this place the way he does," she mumbled.

Luna was sitting in the middle of her bed, stock still, legs crossed under her. She felt all of a sudden as if she were made of stone, and realised a moment later that Cecily had also fallen silent a while earlier.

Apparently, all of the other girls in their dormitory, with the exception of Cecily, were followers of Riddle. Even mousy little Carlotta, who looked as though she couldn't have found it in her to harm a fly. All of them would grow up to be Death Eaters, or to be the wives and sisters and aunts and mothers of Death Eaters. Luna felt her supper sitting in her stomach like a rock. She looked at Cecily, a little desperately. Cecily looked back at her and lifted her shoulder almost imperceptibly, a tiny shrug. Her face looked resigned, and a little bored. _Happens all the time,_ she mouthed to Luna, who lay back on her bed and sighed very quietly.

The other girls were still chattering away, having apparently forgotten the presence of Luna and Cecily; it seemed that when Walburga was in a charitable mood, she and Carlotta could get on tolerably well. Edith remained silent for the rest of the conversation, cleaning dirt out of her glossy fingernails and picking at the embroidery on her bed hangings. Luna let her thoughts drift, wavering in between memories and half-remembered dreams. Riddle's face kept popping up periodically, always with a haughty, exaggerated sneer and an icy look in his eyes, which Luna found mildly odd since she had never actually seen him make such an expression, at least thus far. But the image lingered in her mind anyway, and she couldn't help feeling that this was the face he was really making, inside, all the time, at everybody. It was an ugly face, marring the beauty of his flawless features, but the look she saw in the dream-Riddle's eyes, the same one that she had seen hiding behind his projected mask of politeness and geniality when they had spoken that evening, struck Luna as far uglier and infinitely more horrible.

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 _Thursday, September the 2nd, 1943. 12:48 am._

 _I cannot sleep._

 _I have never been able to sleep on the first night of term at Hogwarts, not since I first came here as a mere boy of eleven._

 _As always, it feels good just to be back. That orphanage is nothing more than a purgatory, a waiting room until I can return to the place I really belong. Every summer spent there, since that first year, has been like an interlude — a pale and hollow hour, inconsequential in the greater scheme of my life, except for the time I spend planning my newest magical endeavours and grandest ambitions. This year, I was impatient to return here from the moment I stepped off the train at King's Cross._

 _Now here I am. Surrounded by my sleeping devotees and followers, my "friends" — Malfoy, Black, Lestrange, Dolohov_ _; they are only a few of the many acolytes I have amassed here at the school._ _I am unquestionably the king of my little hill. I have been for some time, and I confess that obtaining the level of power and influence I now possess at this school has been laughably easy. One might think witches and wizards, being what they are, might be a little more canny and aware of my my true motives than Muggles — not so. I won't complain, but I cannot deny I was mildly surprised at their astounding level of malleability and obliviousness. Disappointed, in a way._

 _Even from the moment I realised that I was the most powerful student at the school, however, I have never been satisfied with what I've achieved. I want more; I always have. I don't want to simply be the best student, the one all the professors look to in a crisis, the one all the students turn to either for protection or an easy excuse to be the violent, brutal creatures they truly are. I want to be the best wizard. Not king of Hogwarts, or of Slytherin, of little hills. King of the world._

 _I want it so badly I can almost taste it, can almost grasp the phantom powers as they spark and flicker around me in the air. The greatest of them being, of course, the one I desire most of all: power over death._

 _I have no illusions about my pursuit of this kind of well-kept secret; it will be no easy task. I still have very little idea of the kind of magics that exist to resist death, only that they are deeply taboo and in most circles considered to be of the darkest kind of wizardry. Frankly, this sounds to me like weakness… cowardice, an inability to take power where it is offered. I cannot help but feel disgust toward those pitiful wastes of potential who avoid speaking about such things purely because they are afraid._

 _I have resolved to devote all my free time this year to the study of this topic. It's not possible for me to spend as much time doing so as I would like, due to the constraints of being a student_ _and my duties as a prefect_ _, but I still have one more year remaining at Hogwarts and after my seventh year I intend to apply for a job teaching here. Given my stellar records, I see no reason why I should be refused; no doubt the female students will all be thrilled. I'm sure I will succeed in recruiting a great many of them to serve my own purposes._

 _On that topic, however… it seems Slytherin House has acquired a transfer student, who just happens to be in her sixth year. I paid little attention to her at first, assuming merely that she would quickly become acquainted with the way of things and leave me and my followers be, along with the other students I have chosen not to bring into my little circle. After catching her staring at me, however, I thought that she might require a little extra safeguard, in case she was one of that suspicious sort who — once their attention is drawn to someone or something, as it appears in this instance to have been drawn to me — becomes obsessive and begins seeing and noticing things they ought not to see or notice._

 _She was sitting with Harlowe (one of those left on the outside, although now that she has been appointed as a prefect I may revisit that decision) and the two of them looked to be getting on well, so I judged it might be the ideal time to make my own introductions — I imagined Harlowe was encouraging her, in that false, clumsy way of hers, to open up, and that the little thing was probably still feeling shy and vulnerable on her first day. The perfect moment to allay any fears or sinister intuitions she might be experiencing surrounding me; a smile and a friendly word or two, I thought to myself, would do the trick easily enough. It nearly always does._

 _This time, however, I encountered something truly fascinating. I had never seen this girl before in my life, and yet she looked at me as though she knew and understood my innermost thoughts and feelings, and found me somehow wanting. Her eyes, when they met mine, were not merely suspicious — they were knowing, accusatory even. No doubt this was due to a false impression she might have formed, a word or two from another student perhaps, in the wrong place at the wrong time (if it was Harlowe, I will have her head). But I was confident in my ability to sway her, to captivate her and draw her to me, as I have so many others…_

 _No matter what I did or said, nothing seemed to please her. When I realised I might be digging a deeper grave for myself in her estimation, I made some excuse and left the two of them alone, and spent the next twenty minutes fuming at the other end of the table. I admit it, she wounded my pride; I fail so rarely in my attempts to charm others that any such instance is curious and extraordinary to me, especially when I am unable to understand why it has occurred._

 _After a little while distracting myself among the others, however, she and the incident had been put out of my mind. Perhaps I was right to do so; it's entirely possible that she is no threat to me at all, that she is simply another vain and haughty cynic who has made up her mind to be pleased with nobody and nothing, and that I ought not to trouble myself with her cavilling manner. But something about her, for whatever reason, did not strike me that way. She might be ordinary, ignorant, and out of place at a school like Hogwarts… but she appears at least passably intelligent, and a passably intelligent witch who makes up her mind to pay attention — even an ordinary and ignorant one — can be dangerous._

 _I don't wish to become distracted from the objectives I have set for myself in this coming year, but I shall take care to keep an eye on her doings at Hogwarts… after all, how hilariously tragic would it be if all my ambitions were to be undone by a silly little girl with a name as ridiculous as Luna Lovegood?_

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A/N: Hey guys, sorry for the late update & thanks for being patient. Remember to leave a comment if you have any thoughts, I love to hear from you all! :) xo shai


	9. Chapter Nine

Recommended soundtrack for this chapter: "Clouds" by BØRNS

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 **Chapter Nine**

Luna awoke bleary-eyed the next morning to find, with a glance at the clock, that she'd missed breakfast and would shortly be late for her first class of the term, a double period of Defence Against the Dark Arts with Professor Merrythought. Accidentally sleeping in wasn't anything unusual for Luna, as she tended to stay up rather late as a matter of habit; in summer she tried her best to rise early because she had usually cooked breakfast for her father, but at Hogwarts she often would get caught up in homework or exploring some interesting topic or other and fall asleep at ungodly hours of the night.

That hadn't been the case yesterday evening, however. In fact, she seemed to remember drifting off rather early as she listened to Carlotta and Walburga gossip about two fourth-year boys and a girl who had mysteriously been killed last May.

Luna's eyes flew open. _How_ in the name of Merlin had that not kept her awake? She wracked her brain for any mention of the girl's name — Walsh, Wilson, West… something beginning with 'W'. Woolsey, maybe? _No…_ With a sigh of exasperation at her own carelessness, Luna resolved to get one of her roommates talking about it again as soon as circumstances would allow.

 _Speaking of which._ Luna looked around at the room, noting with pleasure the sparse beams of sunlight filtering through the lake and in through the window, illuminating a few flecks of dust that were floating lazily around her face. All the other beds were empty and tidily made up; the house-elves had almost certainly been through and done some housekeeping while she slept, then, because there was absolutely no way a girl like Walburga would make any sort of attempt at menial labour with her own two hands. Luna smiled to herself, amused, and levered herself out of bed. Aware that the house-elves would probably find her work unsatisfactory and do it all over again, she made up her own bed anyway, then pawed her hair into a semblance of presentability and changed into her uniform and robes. Another look at the clock told her she could still make it on time if she ran, but Luna didn't feel like running into her first class was how she wanted to start the day. She walked instead, and rather slowly, making patterns with her feet and feeling the magic that flowed through the castle. For the first time since Harry, she felt a little like herself again.

As it happened, she arrived to class only seven minutes late, made some vague, vacant noises about having gotten lost on the way, and was graciously excused by Professor Merrythought.

The professor was an old woman with stark white hair, looking to be around eighty in Muggle terms, which in the wizarding world meant she could be anything from ninety to a hundred and five. She wore expensive and comfortable-looking bright pink robes (Luna deliberately did _not_ think of another Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher she had once known) and a very large pair of tinted spectacles that hid most of her face from view.

The class contained only sixth- and seventh-year Slytherin students, so Luna took the empty seat next to Edith, who was sitting in the third row with her usual impassive expression. She also noted Riddle's location where he sat near the front. He was surrounded by a group of boys, many of whom Luna had noticed the other night as they sat near him at dinner, but only one or two of whom she actually knew by name. Walburga was sitting on the outskirts of their little bubble, in between Abraxas Malfoy and a spindly-looking sixth year with shaggy dark hair and bright blue eyes.

"Now that we're all here," said Professor Merrythought with a close-lipped smile that made her look like a bit like a spider pondering her next meal, "I shall continue. The main topics of your Defence Against the Dark Arts instruction for this year are significantly more advanced than anything any of you have been experimenting with thus far." She paused and raised her white eyebrows above the giant spectacles, causing large wrinkles to stand out on her forehead. "Within the bounds of the law, anyway." A light chuckle spread across the room, but Professor Merrythought's eerie smile remained motionless, fixed in place.

Luna liked her, she decided.

"Sixth-years, you'll be focusing on the use of nonverbal spells, spell resistance and advanced offensive magic. Seventh-years, as you all know, you've taken on this course as an independent study. As with all the classes I teach, this course is built around practical instruction and application, so I'll primarily be taking the position of observer rather than lecturer. All of you are free to ask me any questions you think are pertinent and draw upon my stores of knowledge and experience, or not, to whatever degree you consider most helpful.

"I'll show you the basics of all these concepts in a series of lectures over this first week and a half — Seventh-years, you are excused from these lectures unless you wish to attend, as I'm sure you're all eager to begin work on selecting a topic for your independent studies. After that, sixth-years, you'll be spending your time honing your skills as duelists and potential future Aurors, in the company and with the assistance of your seventh-year peers." Merrythought's smile cracked into a genuine, slightly wolfish grin and she adjusted her spectacles. Luna hid an involuntary smile.

The spindly boy next to Walburga raised his hand. Without turning her head toward him, Professor Merrythought said, "Mr. Black." Luna did her best not to make any sudden movements or indications of her surprise; it hadn't occurred to her that another relative of Sirius might be in school in 1943, although in retrospect it probably should have.

"Professor, we're still missing somebody," Black intoned, "Selwyn isn't here."

The magnificent snowy brows came down. "What are you talking about, Black? She's right there, behind you."

The blue-eyed boy glanced backward at Edith, his eyes skating past Luna as if she wasn't even there.

" _Marcus_ Selwyn, Professor," Black clarified, placing faint emphasis on the first name.

"I'm afraid you are mistaken again, Mr. Black," Merrythought said casually. "Miss Selwyn's prodigal twin has elected not to remain in my class for his sixth year of instruction at Hogwarts. How he expects to graduate, I do not know, but I'm told students are allowed to make their own decisions. As well as cope adequately with the absence of their best friends from a _single_ class." The chilly porcelain smile was back, and Black sank into his chair, sulking. Luna saw Walburga lean over, touching his arm briefly and anxiously whispering something consoling. She thought she might have heard the words _official business_ and _not his secret to tell, Orion._

"If that's all over and done with," the professor went on, "I'd like to have a little demonstration for our first day, to give you all an idea of what we are dealing with. I'm sure you've all heard of the Unforgivable Curses by now."

A wave of murmured _yes_ es and nods came in answer. Professor Merrythought continued more slowly, her tone serious.

"Now, I am certified to use these curses in a purely didactic and educational capacity. I am also required to inform all of you, before I teach you about them, that the use of any one of these is considered unforgivable for a reason. They are fundamentally amoral and cannot be used without violating the inherent rights and human dignity of another."

Luna watched out of the corner of her eye as Riddle tapped his fingers quietly on his desk, obviously bored and impatient.

"For this reason, any witch or wizard who is found to be using or to have previously used an Unforgivable Curse within the three-year statute of limitations will almost certainly be slapped with a life sentence in Azkaban. And the Dementors do not grant any _privileges_ for good behaviour." Behind the tinted spectacles, Merrythought's gaze was almost tangible in its sharpness. "Am I understood?"

The same quiet, vague chorus of positive responses followed again.

" _Am I_ understood?" Merrythought repeated, her gnarled hands gripping the edge of her wooden desk and the knuckles fading white.

"Yes, Professor," said a single voice. Luna didn't need to bother looking for the source; it was Riddle.

There was a moment of tense silence as the professor flatly stared at him. Evidently the uncrowned king of Slytherin House had begun testing his limits in other areas.

After a moment, apparently having found no firm grounds on which to base any sort of direct accusation or reprimand, Merrythought relented and went on with her lecture. She hid her annoyance with impressive aplomb, although her silver aura was crackling with agitation and unease.

"There are three Unforgivable Curses," Merrythought said at last, continuing as if the moment of friction had not happened. "They are the Imperius Curse, the Cruciatus Curse, and the Killing Curse — sometimes better known by its incantation, which I hope most of you will never hear uttered outside of this classroom.

"I will demonstrate only one of them today. As it is the least frightful to witness, if not to ponder, I'd like to begin with the Imperius Curse. Might I have a volunteer?"

She waited, smiling pleasantly, as the room sat in complete silence. Everyone seemed to be waiting for Riddle to say something or make some sort of indication, and Merrythought was obviously aware of it.

Luna considered this for a moment. There were advantages and disadvantages to what she was about to do. Openly rebelling against Riddle's authority would draw a certain unwelcome kind of attention to her, although she might later claim ignorance when confronted on it (this would add to her growing list of white lies). On the other hand, Luna genuinely liked her new teacher, and the thought of sitting passively while Riddle silently humiliated Professor Merrythought — as composed as the woman would undoubtedly remain in the face of such awkwardness — was deeply uncomfortable to her.

Before she knew it, her hand had drifted into the air of its own accord. When Professor Merrythought nodded to her and said, "Miss Lovegood," every head in the room turned toward her as if they were all seated on a horde of sinister wind-up toys. Luna caught one or two baleful glares as she rose from her seat and strode to the front of the room, but most of the looks she saw were more befuddled than angry. She deliberately didn't look at Riddle, as she was suddenly and absurdly afraid that his eyes would be like Voldemort's. Would they flash blood-red with malice now, the way they would inevitably do some day in the future, if she were to fail?

The thought made her hands begin to shake, but she held them still. Professor Merrythought directed her to stand by the blackboard and face the class. Luna looked straight ahead, allowing her gaze to grow fuzzy and unfocused. Back in her own time, when she had done this, a thousand faint little phantoms would begin to flit about in her vision, just waiting to be seen and studied properly with the correct set of magical tools. Now, there was nothing; just a wall, a few magical knick-knacks, the skeleton of some large beast, and a sea of blurry faces.

"I am going to cast an Imperius Curse on Miss Lovegood," Merrythought was saying. "The spell, in this instance, will inflict upon her a strong compulsion to walk backwards around the room with one hand upon her nose. She will attempt to resist and remain motionless. Are you ready?" This last was directed, in a lower tone, at Luna. She nodded, smiling slightly and twining her hands together.

Merrythought pointed her wand at Luna and intoned, " _Imperio._ "

Luna had never been placed under an Imperius Curse before, not in all the days before nor during the war. She had been tortured many times, of course, mostly by the Carrow siblings, although Bellatrix Lestrange had also taken a turn or two when Luna had been imprisoned in the Malfoy house. A few _avada kedavras_ had also been shot her way during some of the battles at Hogwarts, and one had been a rather near miss. Fortunately, however, superior aim did not appear to be a virtue possessed of most of Voldemort's Death Eaters, and most of the time Luna was agile enough to avoid direct and highly visible shots like the bright green Killing Curse. She was familiar with the feel of it, however; when that one near miss had seared past her head, she'd felt its verdant, electric malice reaching for her with eager fingers, and only just falling short. The Killing Curse was a shudder-inducing horror, an abomination against nature, a seething demon in a bolt of emerald light. The Cruciatus was just pain; there was nothing else to be said about it, really. It was the centre of the universe when you were in the midst of it, and once it was over it immediately ceased to matter.

The Imperius Curse, however, was somehow unlike both of them. Luna felt it swamp her mind like fog, making her thoughts hazy and unfocused and faintly pleasant in a way that was somehow unbearable, until she felt that if she opened her mouth a cloud of sickly-sweet vapour would pour out instead of words. And what was in the vapour was _walk backwards round the room with one hand on your nose, won't you please, dear? It would be so nice and so easy and you would be so happy if you'd only walk round the room backwards with just one hand — just one hand! — on your nose._

Instinctively and immediately, without forethought, she reacted against it. The cloying and subtle instruction was creeping slowly into the corners of her mind, so she simply dropped her restraints and let it — as it was forever longing to do — expand. Her thoughts spun out of joint like helicopter seeds, floating this way and that, rising up into the air and out of the room and through the glowing blanket of the sky and up into the cosmos. Luna's mind was _vast_ ; she'd known this since she was a little girl, but she rarely allowed herself to really explore this aspect of her consciousness, this ability to let herself soar at speed into the realms of dream and nightmare, whenever she wanted, wherever she wanted, and seek the truths of the universe. It wasn't practical for living in the world, and so she held back her flights of fancy and saved them for times when she could really be alone and not have to worry about anybody else.

Right now, _she_ was not worried about anybody else. _She_ was not even worried about herself. Perhaps Luna would be happy if she walked backwards round the classroom with a hand on her nose, but _she_ was not Luna any more. _She_ was hovering by the side of her sister, the moon; witnessing the death of an owl through the eyes of a mouse; following people into alleyways, into cellars, into the depths of their own minds. _She_ looked at the planet from above and saw the flashing and flickering souls of its billions of inhabitants, bright as stars from the lonely darkness of space. The fog was far from her, tiny, trying in vain to expand to match her magnitude. _She_ knew it would not catch her, not ever. There was too much out there for her to explore, too many far extremes she could reach in a heartbeat. _She_ was bigger than a spell.

In the classroom, Luna's blank, relaxed face brightened slowly into a small, secretive, and positively beatific smile. From the outside, _she_ watched as the lips somehow moved and the bell-like voice rang out: "Professor?"

The bright-souled, silver-shrouded creature that was Galatea Merrythought stood silently for a second, dumbfounded. After a moment she seemed to return to herself and muttered, " _Finite incantatem._ " In her lower mind, Luna felt the fog dissipate and vanish. With significant effort, she drew herself back in, reeling in all the pieces of her soul that had wandered out or gone astray, piecing herself back together. When she felt whole again — or at least close enough — she turned toward Professor Merrythought. Luna stood silently as the woman reached up with trembling hands and removed the tinted spectacles. Her eyes, wide with shock and intrigue, were mismatched; one of them was a warm honey-brown, the other a stark yellowed off-white with veins of bright blue that spread out from the inky pupil like little pale rivers. Luna dearly wished to ask her about it, as she was certain the tale would be singularly diverting, but she knew that now was not the time.

"My dear girl," said the professor, "do you understand what just occurred?"

Luna was unsure how to respond, and simply looked at her.

"Have you had training in resisting the Imperius Curse? Have you been placed under it before?" Merrythought pressed. Luna shook her head at both questions, beginning to grow uneasy.

"I've seen others resist the Imperius Curse before," breathed Merrythought, her attention shifting from Luna until she appeared to be speaking more to herself than to anyone else in the room. "But never so completely, never without training of some kind… Certainly never for as long as you just did… and a _student_ …" Her attention fell back on Luna. "My dear, I would love to discuss this with you, if you perhaps have a free period sometime today — ? But for now, I'm afraid we must consider the enrichment of your fellow students, and repeat the demonstration with another volunteer. Sit down, Miss Lovegood. If I might ask another student?"

A flock of hands shot up into the air as the other students promptly forgot their reasons for avoiding volunteering and grew eager to test the strength of their own wills against that of the vacant-eyed new girl. Luna moved to return to her seat.

As she was doing so the realisation hit her abruptly, with a sick shock, that Riddle had undoubtedly observed the whole thing. As though under a compulsion more insidious than that of _imperio_ , she felt her gaze move wide-eyed to where he sat. Those intelligent green eyes stared sharply back at her, but the expression contained within them was not anger, or confusion, or suspicion, or any other emotion she might have expected. Instead it read to her like some strange amalgam of surprise, fascination, and… awe. As she watched, the look of admiration shifted and morphed hideously into unabashed avarice.

A wave of disgust passed through her. He was coveting this power of hers, this mysterious invulnerability. Probably he would assume it was a kind of magic and try to get her to teach it to him. She'd never tried to teach it to anybody else, but if it was capable of being taught, he would be the last one who would be able to learn it. True, his magical abilities were prodigious, but his mind was disgracefully narrow, confined to the plots and cares and petty revenges of his own little world. She doubted he was even capable of noticing a world outside of himself, much less reaching into it. Averting her eyes, Luna walked calmly back to her seat and sat back down next to Edith, who neither said nor did anything to acknowledge her.

The rest of the lesson passed uneventfully. The other student selected, a girl with mouse-brown hair and spectacles, walked the circuit of the room almost reverently, as if she were leaving the throne room of a king and could not turn her back. The hand on her nose was a mere afterthought, resting so delicately that she merely appeared to be artfully covering her mouth. The other students were laughing, but Luna found the whole spectacle rather somber. The girl never batted an eyelash, and when the professor released her from the curse, she returned to her seat looking as if she had already forgotten about the whole thing.

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A/N: I'm done with finals and have moved out of my dorm, so I figured you guys were left waiting long enough. xo shai


	10. Chapter Ten

Recommended soundtrack for this chapter: "More Than This" by Roxy Music, "Killer In The Streets" by The Raveonettes

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 **Chapter Ten**

Luna spent the rest of the day in a kind of nervous trance, always half-expecting Riddle to pop out from some classroom doorway or behind a corner and blast her with the full force of his perfect, repulsive smile before mercilessly interrogating her about her resistance to the Imperius Curse. He never did, but she caught him glancing at her in the Great Hall during lunch, and left after her third bite of French onion soup.

She didn't know why she felt so compelled to avoid him; after all, he was the very reason she'd decided to travel back in time, leave her friends, her teachers, everything familiar. But she just _knew_ that she wasn't ready to talk to him, at least not without the involvement of a well-timed hex or two. The wounds his future self had indirectly inflicted on her and her friends — physical or not — were still too fresh, and without Ron there to ground her she felt adrift and unsteady. So instead of spending her free period studying in the Slytherin common room (where he was almost certain to be, given that he also had a free period that hour and apparently didn't like to wander very far from the dungeons in his spare time) she went to see Professor Merrythought about the incident in class that morning.

As it happened, this meeting consisted almost entirely of a series of earnest questions posed by Merrythought and a corresponding series of answering _no'_ s. Luna learned nothing about her abilities, only that they were so uncommon as to be nearly unheard of, and after an unfruitful conversation finally agreed to participate in further study of the phenomenon at some unspecified point in the future. She left Professor Merrythought's office feeling somehow deflated and with a slightly less enthusiastic high opinion of her teacher, although she still looked forward to being able to practise her duelling over the course of the term (and perhaps finally hit Riddle with that perfect hex so she could stop daydreaming about it).

The next period of the day was Care of Magical Creatures at two o'clock, Luna's second-to-last before ending with Divination, and she decided to go down to the forest early so as to safely avoid any contact with Riddle. She made her way down to the bloated edge of the Forbidden Forest in a discomfited mood, unsure whether she had high hopes for the class or not; she had been no great admirer of Professor Hagrid's teaching style, but then again there was nothing to ensure that Professor Kettleburn would be in any way superior. She skipped lightly down the hill nonetheless, doing her best to stay optimistic even as the bezoar in her shoe dug into the side of her heel.

When she reached the edge of the forest, there was a gaggle of students already standing around waiting for Kettleburn to arrive. "You're limping," observed one of them in a cool, concerned alto. Luna looked for the source and her eyes met a pair of bright willow-brown ones belonging to a female student. The girl had a face which was more intriguing than beautiful, her severe features contrasting interestingly with the gentle look in her eyes; she was thin with frizzy hair and strong eyebrows, and judging by her uniform was evidently a Gryffindor. She looked vaguely familiar (as did her aura, a peaceful and muted sea green), but Luna couldn't quite place her in the sea of students she'd seen or been introduced to over the past day.

Luna liked the other girl instantly, and smiled happily back at her. "Yes, I am," she replied. "It's nothing to worry about, though. Thank you."

"Certainly," replied the Gryffindor, then squinted at her for a moment, frowning. "Wait — are you Lovegood? The transfer?"

Luna nodded and supplemented the affirmation with an additional "Yes."

Suddenly the girl smiled, and her face lit up beautifully, so like a star that Luna's own smile grew brighter in response. "It's very nice to meet you," the girl said graciously. "Luna, was it? I'm Euphemia Crinsey-Abbott."

Luna's mind ground briefly to a halt. Where had she heard that name before?

"You might have seen me at the Sorting Feast — Dippet always makes the prefects stand up and be recognised," Euphemia went on, rolling her pale eyes slightly before meeting Luna's again with a grin.

Luna blinked abruptly. "Oh! Yes, I did see you. You're a prefect." She felt mildly silly at the obvious redundancy of restating this fact, but the words kept blithely falling out against her will. "Along with Everett Weasley."

Euphemia nodded. "Yes. Do you know him?"

The lie floated filmily to the surface of Luna's mind and slipped out of her mouth almost before she realised what was happening. "Only by word of mouth. My family has some ties to the Weasleys. I've never met him, but supposedly his great-grandfather knew my grandmother once upon a time."

Euphemia's eyes glazed over slightly, which Luna saw with faint disappointment rather than the proper satisfaction at having pulled off the lie. She didn't like how much of a Slytherin she was becoming. Abruptly she was reminded of a late-night conversation with Hermione and Neville, during one of their breaks from working, when Hermione had elaborated to her the true nature of Harry's fantastically useful Potions book and then gone on tangentially to mention a Muggle publication of the 16th century by a man named Machiavelli. The book had supposedly advocated a ruthless manipulation of others and deceit as a way of life. Had the man been a wizard, no doubt he would have got on rather well with Slytherin and his ilk. At the time, the idea of such a lifestyle had made Luna profoundly uncomfortable; now, the fact that it no longer did to nearly the same degree made her feel even more deeply disturbed. She had come here to make Riddle a better person, not make herself worse.

All these thoughts passed in a moment or two of silence, and when Luna blinked again Euphemia was looking at her curiously. "Are sure you're all right?" the brown-haired girl inquired, all traces of the smile gone.

Luna shook her head to clear it and then said, "Oh, yes. I tend to get lost in my thoughts sometimes."

Euphemia looked amused. "I completely understand. Ev's the same way. Fleamont and I — that's a friend of ours — always make fun of him for it. Not that it's really all that odd," she added hastily, looking as though she'd just realised Luna might take offence at this. Luna, however, smiled at her to indicate otherwise.

"I don't think it's making fun if you're all really friends, and everybody understands. It's just a joke that everyone can laugh at. That's a nice thing."

Euphemia blinked and then smiled again, more slowly this time, so that watching her face was like watching the sun come out from behind clouds. Her aura glittered magnificently for a moment and reminded Luna of the ocean at sunset, of Bill and Fleur Weasley's little cottage by the sea. Of Harry and war-time and burying Dobby the house-elf in the sandy earth. She felt her own smile slip, and Euphemia's face swam in front of her as the happy expression fell again into a look of concern.

Just as Euphemia opened her mouth to ask again whether Luna was all right, a deep, slightly nasal voice interrupted. "Hello, students!"

Both of them turned; there stood a burly, barrel-chested man with red cheeks and iron-grey hair reaching to his shoulders, whom Luna presumed to be the awaited Professor Kettleburn. A scattered chorus of _afternoon, professor_ and _hello_ and one or two muttered _finally!_ s rose up in answer.

"Do any of you have an idea of what I have planned for you?" Professor Kettleburn asked, rubbing his palms together excitedly. He strode forward into the centre of the circle of students; as he walked, Luna caught a glimpse of a wooden ankle and a stiff gait that implied the presence of an artificial, possibly enchanted limb. Without waiting for a response, Kettleburn burst out, "Mooncalves! Mooncalves, mooncalves! Some of the most _glorious_ creatures ever to walk the earth! Certainly none of you have studied them before?" He looked around eagerly, but as before went on too quickly to allow for any response. "Of course not, of course not! They really are lovely creatures. Muggles think they're _space aliens_ , you know! They love dancing in the moonlight and their manure is simply glorious for plants. Have any of you heard of these creatures even a little? Perhaps read of them in _Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them!_ Written by the _wonderful_ , wonderful Newt Scamander?" His face was so endearing and almost puppyish, and contrasted so wonderfully with his low and booming voice that sounded as if it belonged at funerals reciting eulogies, that Luna found it difficult to be irritated with his over-eager manner and obviously rather unrefined teaching skills. Instead, she merely exchanged a grinning glance with Euphemia Crinsey-Abbott and shifted her weight into a comfortable standing position as Kettleburn launched into a lengthy and ardent lecture on the life and times of the eminent Newt Scamander before stumbling back onto the topic of Mooncalves in the last five minutes of class.

As Luna had to hurry to the North Tower for her final class of the day, she made her way briskly off to the castle once Kettleburn had dismissed them. Euphemia, running to catch up, accompanied her to the front doors.

"What classes have you got this term?" Euphemia inquired eagerly. "Any others with Gryffindor? I'd love for you to meet my friends. Perhaps we could all study together sometime. I just know we'd all get on perfectly."

Her friendly, reserved enthusiasm was infectious, and Luna told her quickly and with a half-smile that she was also taking Charms, which was a Gryffindor-Slytherin class. Euphemia responded excitedly that both Everett and Fleamont were taking Charms as well, and that she would look forward to seeing Luna again at ten o'clock Monday morning — "And don't be late! Professor Mulciber hates tardiness." Luna mentally remarked upon the name and the oddity of its association with a Charms class, but did not comment on this to Euphemia. The two of them said goodbye at the doors, Euphemia heading in the direction of the Gryffindor common room and Luna making her way to Divination class.

Immediately upon entering the classroom at the top of the tower, Luna felt the hairs on the back of her neck come to attention, and knew instantly that _he_ had beat her to the classroom. Abruptly she realised why it was so easy to tell when he was around: he had no aura. The uncomfortable blank space where it should have been stood out like a hole in the air, and seemed to suck warmth and light out of the whole room; she could sense it without even looking, almost ostentatious in its conspicuous absence. When she concentrated, a feeling of prickling curiosity came over her; it seemed perhaps as if he really did have an aura and was somehow… hiding it from her, with that kind of childish furtiveness to which he had apparently always been prone. She doubted he was doing it consciously, but it certainly went along with what she knew of his personality.

It annoyed her.

Few things managed to get past her impenetrable veneer of dreamy obliviousness and truly irritate Luna, but it seemed that Tom Riddle possessed many rare powers unknown to the majority of wizardkind, this ostensibly being one of them.

She shook off the feeling, the hot, prickling emotion needling at her chest and throat and pushing down on her eyebrows, and took a deep, cleansing breath before looking around the room.

Half Slytherin, half Ravenclaw. A respectable blend of each in the middle, but the two houses were evidently still not comfortable enough with each other to mix evenly throughout the room. Luna spotted a few familiar faces from Slytherin (she refused to think of it as her own house, not with the Ravenclaws right there within spitting distance), but nobody she knew well. Riddle, to her relief, did not look up at her entrance — though something told her he had noticed — and remained deeply in conversation with two other Slytherin students. She recognised Orion Black and another boy whom Cecily had pointed out to her as Evan Rosier, one of Riddle's gang who had once gone around with Carlotta for a week and a half on a dare before dropping her like a sack of bat spleens. Luna let her eyes slide over the three of them as if they weren't there, and briefly scanned the room again, looking for a place to sit. There was nobody among the Slytherins that she'd feel comfortable practising Divination in front of. She always had the option of hiding her gift and faking a firmly closed inner eye, of course, but after the incident in Defence Against the Dark Arts that morning she felt such obfuscation to be practically redundant. Due in part to bad luck and in part to her own thoughtlessness, she'd managed to give herself away quite effectively. If Riddle hadn't already known she was somebody to look out for, then he certainly did now.

Perhaps if she could find a friendly face among the Ravenclaws, somebody who wouldn't run straight to Riddle with whatever secrets Luna happened to reveal in the course of her study, she wouldn't need to waste time failing the class unnecessarily. She wouldn't have to hide her affinity for the Sight, but neither would she be handing the fruits of her labours over to Riddle on a silver platter.

As she turned toward the other side of the room, a flash of light caught her eye the likes of which she'd never quite seen before. A dark, dazzling blue-violet aura with a beautiful depth of colour was flickering anxiously around the form of a little Ravenclaw girl with a heap of wild red hair, who was sitting hunched over in the corner by herself. Directing her gaze steadily forward so as to avoid glancing inadvertently at her adversary, Luna drifted over to her.

"May I sit here?" Luna inquired. The girl looked up, brown eyes wide, and nodded quickly.

"What's your name?" asked the Ravenclaw. Her voice was soft, high, and musical, but of a slightly richer timbre than Luna's own. Then her eyes went wide again. "Oh, no, I know! You're Luna Lovegood, aren't you? The Slytherin transfer?"

Luna smiled in affirmation.

"My name is Perpetua Fancourt. It's nice to meet you." The other girl's mouth curved into a dimpled grin, and her brown eyes grew bright. "Nobody… um, people from my own house don't really sit with me in class. You might have heard… So I-I mean, I know you probably didn't choose me to sit with just to be kind. But thanks, anyway."

Luna twined her fingers together. "I needed somebody to sit with too. Thank _you_ for being lovely and nice." Then she was silent a moment. "If you don't want to talk about it that's perfectly all right, but why did you say that none of the other Ravenclaws will sit with you?"

Perpetua flushed slightly. "Oh… it's nothing, really. I do have friends in Ravenclaw. But, well, I'm a — a bastard. Some witches and wizards still have a rather hard time with that idea. Something we've picked up from the Muggles, I suppose… I must say I don't really understand it — if the biggest concern is producing lots of magical children, why everybody needs to be married I haven't a clue…" Her voice had grown hushed and taken on a slightly disheartened tinge, as it seemed this was an issue which had troubled her for a long while. "But anyway — my friends won't always sit with me outside of the Ravenclaw common room. It sort of comes and goes… sometimes they forget or decide they don't care. And they always talk to me when we're all together in the Tower. But it's just nice… to be able to sit with somebody." She suddenly looked alarmed, as if worried Luna would suddenly get up and leave upon hearing all this, and ducked her head slightly. Luna's smile quirked.

"I understand," she said softly. Perpetua looked up, her face hopeful again. Luna paused, then said, "Let's be friends. I'll sit with you." The conversation rolled to a comfortable halt as the two of them sat there smiling at each other. A second later a small paper plane drifted gracefully to rest on their table, and everything inside Luna's mind seemed to freeze. It had come from the Slytherin side of the classroom.

Perpetua looked at her inquiringly, and when Luna failed to respond she reached for the plane. Luna reached out and caught the other girl's wrist. "Sorry," she said, withdrawing her hand quickly and picking up the plane. Her own voice sounded hollow to her ears. "I think it's for me." Taking deep breaths, she unfolded the plane.

It was an elegantly scripted note, brief and to the point.

 _You're sitting with a half-blood bastard, Lovegood. Just thought you ought to know. Rosier._

Luna carefully refolded the plane, replaced it on the table, contemplated briefly, and then pointed her wand at it and clearly pronounced, " _Reducto._ " Immediately, the plane disintegrated, leaving a small scorch mark on the expensive-looking wood. Luna scratched at it briefly with a fingernail and then turned her head so that Riddle and his two cronies were in her peripheral vision.

Black was laughing quietly; Rosier looked about half-annoyed and half-impressed despite himself. Riddle's face was turned away so that she couldn't see his expression; his posture appeared relaxed, but his hands, lying clenched and white-knuckled under the table, suggested some less controlled reaction.

Just as Luna turned back to Perpetua, who had a questioning look in her eyes, the loud sound of heeled shoes on wood filled the classroom. A piece of chalk rose from the rim of the blackboard on the wall and hastily spelled out, in a jagged and messy script, _PROF. SCYLLA SHEARWATER._ After this it paused for a moment in midair and added, almost as an afterthought, a little face with a smile so wide it looked more like a cartoonish rictus.

Having sufficiently introduced herself, Professor Shearwater strode to the front of the room and turned gracefully to face all of them. She was an extremely tall and thin woman, whose stature reminded Luna faintly of an uncloaked Dementor. Although this made the professor more eerie-looking than menacing per se, her long pin-straight red hair which hung lankly about her shoulders and her hollow-cheeked, wide-eyed visage did nothing to alleviate the effect. Luna recognised in her the haunted nature of a woman who had looked into the future, had not been driven mad by it, and yet had no way of coping with her knowledge. Luna had dealt with the few smatterings of prophecies she'd been able to glean by putting them away from her mind and examining them in pieces; Professor Trelawney, who'd had the strongest gift for prophecy of anybody Luna had ever met, simply forgot them all the instant after she spoke them. From looking at Professor Shearwater, it would seem that she did neither. Luna immediately felt sympathetic, and did her best to pay attention when Professor Shearwater opened her mouth and began to speak, a brittle smile on her wide lips.

"Good afternoon, class. I am Professor Shearwater. I trust you all know why we are here." The smile remained fixed on the professor's face, but her eyes were darting nervously about the room. "Foreknowledge of the future is not a power to be taken lightly, nor is it one possessed by just any witch or wizard. Those of you who succeed in this class will learn to wield this power responsibly and with wisdom. Those of you who do not will go on to live perfectly wonderful lives without it." In the blink of an eye, the smile grew genuine. "By no means is Divination a tool that any of you will need. Think of it more as an exciting new frontier. Divination is best done when its practitioner seeks knowledge for the sake of knowledge; any practical uses of prophecy, or even the smallest glimpses of the future, are best saved for when that future arrives. Prophecy does not lend itself to paranoia, nor to idle curiosity."

Luna stole a glance at Riddle; he was facing Shearwater so that she could see his expression. The alabaster jaw pulsed as he clenched his teeth, and his dark eyes were glinting with annoyance. She hid a smile. Evidently he must be aware of his failings to some extent, if he was so sensitive to an indirect comment that was even faintly critical.

"I mention this to all of you," Professor Shearwater went on softly, "because the Advanced Divination class tends to fill up much more rapidly during times when the world seems to be in turmoil. Many of us pretend to be unaffected by Muggle conflict and strife, but the truth is that we are not. Their population is far too large, and ours far too small, for us to remain entirely isolated from any problem they face — nor should we be, in my opinion. But I digress." She paused, her stillness for a moment almost statuesque. "I simply wish you all to know that divining the future is no antidote to fear. In fact, at times it may serve to amplify what worries you already possess, consciously or subconsciously." Her eyes blazed solemnly as she looked at all of them. "Peace, serenity, hope for the future, these things cannot be obtained through the acquisition of knowledge. They must come from within, from the deepest centre of the soul. If you have entered into this class with the belief that learning further practice of Divination will comfort you, will solve your problems and alleviate your worries… you are sadly mistaken."

Luna felt a smile creeping over her face. Finally, a Divination professor who really _knew_ what to say, who could put her own half-formed ideas about teaching foresight into words. She looked at Riddle again, trying to gauge his reaction; he was wooden-faced, his nostrils flaring, and he was clearly struggling to avoid scowling at a professor in the middle of class. Luna was suddenly struck by a mental image of him as a professor at Hogwarts himself — a job, according to his history, he evidently wanted — making the same strained face as he suffered through a class of rowdy first-years completely uninterested in learning Defence Against the Dark Arts. It was a ridiculous concept; more probably, he would be able to charm them all with ease, and could mesmerise even the most disaffected eleven-year-old into complete adoration of whatever subject he chose. But the image persisted, and just as Riddle's face began to fall back into relaxed passivity, Luna was unable to suppress a giggle.

Immediately his eyes flicked to hers, and the laugh died on her lips. The look on his face was one of such hatred and blatant murderous intent that she felt a shudder pass through her, and the old terror of the man who had been Voldemort was back in a heartbeat. She had heard of his famous temper, had witnessed it in front of her just seconds ago, but having it directed at her was an entirely different matter. Yet the rage in his eyes was gone so quickly that as before, she almost might have felt she'd made it up. As Luna stared back at him, paralysed like a rabbit, he seemed to make an effort at softening his face, and a moment later his mouth curved again into that beautiful smile, the eyes gleaming with a hint of conspiratorial humour. The expression looked so natural on him, so inviting and friendly, that it was impossible to fail to see how anybody could be taken in by it; but it made Luna feel infinitely worse. An instant later, he turned back to the front of the classroom, seeming to refocus on Professor Shearwater.

This event, taking place in the space of no more than a few seconds, had shown Luna two things. First, one thing that she had already known: his anger was volatile, operated at extremes, was indiscriminate in terms of its targets, and probably was constantly on the edge of becoming violent. Second, another thing which served to confirm a fear that had been creeping into her heart like a blight: he had not been content simply to strike terror into her heart and leave her with the silent and helpless awareness that Tom Riddle was no one to be trifled with. This he might have done with any other student; none of them would have been bold or influential enough to bring any sort of general suspicion against him, not with the level of power he held in the school. But instead, he had paused, restrained his anger, and made an effort to charm her, to ameliorate her obvious dismay — her, personally. She could not pretend to herself, as she had tried the entire day to do, that she had imagined his awareness of her or overestimated his interest in her abilities; he certainly knew who she was, and for whatever reason, frightening her into compliance was not a part of his current plans.

Luna knew a part of her should be pleased at this development. After all, as she had repeated to herself many times previously, she was here _solely_ to place herself within Riddle's life and prevent him from becoming the person that he would otherwise inevitably become. But it was impossible to deny that even now, in 1943, when he was only sixteen, Tom Riddle was someone to fear. Luna had never been a timid or fearful person, but she was also not stupid, and she knew a threat when she saw one.

She had heard, in the Muggle whisperings of Ottery St. Catchpole near her home, of children who liked to catch rats and cut off their heads. They did it, muttered the Muggles under the awnings of their little shops and out of their pristine windows, not because they knew it was wrong and wished to rebel, but simply because they didn't understand. They did it for sport: pain and suffering, to them, was only another game they could play at and win. When she had seen the look in Tom's eyes, she knew that if he could have done it and got away scot free with all of his plans still in motion — regardless of what use she might have served to him — he would have killed her right then, on the spot, in cold blood. She could have become his first Horcrux, as far as she knew. For a half-laugh. For a silly fantasy.

She didn't know if he had cut rats' heads off as a boy. She wasn't sure it mattered. He was dangerous, not just in the abstract, in his far-distant future, but _now_ , to her and to the people she had already begun to care about. To Euphemia, and Perpetua, Professor Shearwater and Professor Merrythought, overexcitable Professor Kettleburn, absentminded and warm Professor Dippet. To Fleamont and Everett, whom she had not yet even had the chance to meet. Even Professor Dumbledore.

Luna blinked rapidly as she looked back toward the front of the classroom. She would do it. Not later, not two weeks from today or a month from today, but now. And she might do it out of pity for the soul of Tom Marvolo Riddle, but she also did it for the souls he would one day grow up to rip from their bodies so that he could live another ten or fifty or hundred years, for the defenceless innocents and incompetent Death Eaters alike that he would slaughter on a whim. She could not allow him to become that person, both for his own sake and for theirs. If so much suffering could be prevented, and if she could be the one to do it, she could not falter, could not second-guess. Would not be afraid.

As Professor Shearwater talked and wrote on the blackboard about the five-possibly-six variable principles of prophetic incursion, Luna felt her fear detach from her body and float away.


	11. Chapter Eleven

Recommended soundtrack for this chapter: "Fragment" by Trespassers William

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 **Chapter Eleven**

The following week passed in a blur of faces, names, half-completed homework assignments, and (mostly) unchallenging spellwork.

Euphemia graciously introduced Luna to her friends Everett and Fleamont — the latter of whom, Luna was surprised and a little stricken to find, possessed the surname of Potter. He resembled Harry not at all, aside from the disastrous mess of black hair; after spending a little time in the company of the three of them, however, she observed something of Harry's characteristic expressions in Fleamont's face, and was able to mentally translate Euphemia's striking features into that bright-eyed, gentle angularity that had been present in the looks of Harry and his father.

At first Luna had expected to find it difficult to be around people who reminded her so strongly of absent friends, but she quickly found that they provided the sense of comfort and familiarity she had been so desperately craving. The three of them instantly adopted her into their circle, and soon enough were talking and laughing with her as if she had always been a part of their lives. Everett's unobtrusive, witty candour, Euphemia's bright and loving warmth, Fleamont's zest for life and theatrical sense of humour; they gave her life colour, instilled in her a sense of hope and strength that made her believe she really could do what she had come here to do.

Her friendship with Perpetua, as well, was slowly beginning to flower. The girl was dazzlingly intelligent, an excellent witch, and clearly longing for a friend, which Luna was glad to be to her. Nearly all of Luna's free time was spent either alone, or in the company of her three Gryffindor friends or Perpetua (she had designs toward introducing Perpetua to the trio and thereby procuring for her more friends, but hadn't yet come across the right opportunity to do so). Occasionally she would sit in the dorms with Cecily and quietly do homework or listen to her gossip about the goings-on of Slytherin house; for the most part, however, Luna had successfully managed to alienate herself from the Slytherins, and from Riddle, with whom she had not spoken since their introduction at the Sorting Feast. This fact had, as of yet, failed to occur to her.

On the afternoon of September the ninth, Luna was sitting in the library with her Gryffindor compatriots as the four of them tried and failed to focus on studying for the impending Charms exam that would be taking place on the following Monday. She was wishing briefly for the presence of Hermione (who would have brought them all to attention in a matter of moments), when a figure slipping out of the Restricted Section caught Luna's eye. She easily identified the student, despite his evident desire to avoid being seen: Marcus Selwyn, twin brother of Edith and best friend of Orion Black — and whom she had only laid eyes upon perhaps twice over the course of the week, despite his belonging to both her house and her year. She momentarily considered pointing him out to Everett and Euphemia, but decided against it, as allowing him to remain inconspicuous might lead him into further mistakes or other things that might clue her in as to what he (and, by extension, almost certainly Riddle) might be up to. She trusted her friends, but given the bizarre and complex reality of her mission, it didn't seem like the best idea to risk having to explain it to them in exchange for potentially enlisting their help.

As she was directing a well-timed question regarding Caterwauling Charms at Euphemia, Luna noticed someone else who seemed to have been paying attention to the clandestine Slytherin presence in the library: Yancy Bulstrode, Carlotta's older brother and probably the only member of his family to have ever been a member of Gryffindor house. He was also a prefect, and so when he motioned her aside as her friends were leaving the library, Luna followed.

"You saw Selwyn leaving the Restricted Section earlier?" he began, and Luna nodded, meeting his eyes. He nodded faintly back, and then after a moment inquired, "I'm sorry to have to ask you this, but have you got any idea what he might have been up to in there?"

Luna shook her head. "Not really." She paused briefly, thinking. "You haven't spoken to Carlotta about it." Her tone was level; she knew what his answer would be.

Yancy sighed. "No. I believe that whatever Selwyn's up to, it has something to do with another prefect in your house. He's doing everything legitimately, with a prefect's permission and all, not technically breaking any rules. I don't think Carlotta would be willing to talk about it with me." He shifted uncomfortably. "I… wasn't sure at first that I could ask you about it, either, but given that you know Euphemia and Everett, and you don't really seem to be friends with Riddle, I thought — " He came to a halt, evidently not having intended to let slip to whom specifically he had been referring.

"You don't need to worry, Yancy," said Luna quickly. "I know Riddle's up to something, too, and I'd like to find out what it is. I'll keep an eye on Marcus for you, and if I see anything I'll let you know."

At this, he looked much relieved. "Oh, brilliant. Thank you, Lovegood. It's been bothering me for ages — nobody seems willing to hear a word against him, especially the professors…"

Luna tilted her head. "Actually, I think you're wrong about that. You might be surprised." She smiled at him, and skipped off to catch up with Euphemia on her way to Care of Magical Creatures, leaving Yancy to puzzle out that remark by himself.

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Luna ended the day in Divination with Perpetua.

"Scrying-glasses and crystal balls," Professor Shearwater was saying, "as you all know, are some of the most well-known methods of Divination. Of the two, crystal balls are typically favoured for their reliability, but many diviners maintain that scrying-glasses are capable of producing prophecy with astronomically higher scoring in the Paphlagonian Fateful Index." She paused, her bony nose rumpling; abruptly, she doubled over in a sneeze, and straightened again with a surreptitious wipe of her mouth before continuing. "Over the next few days, each of you will work on improving your proficiency with one or both of these; it's up to you to decide on your preference, but as two of my scrying-glasses are in need of repair, most of you will be working with the crystals for today. Make good use of your time, and be sure to record any images you see, whether or not you believe them to be prophetic; our most keen insights often come from unexpected places." The professor smiled wanly and, with a gesture of her wand, opened a pair of tall wooden cabinets to the side of the room. The sound of shuffling feet filled the room as students rushed to claim their chosen magical devices. Luna, engaged in watching Perpetua's doodled Golden Snidget whizz around and behind the neat lines of her notes, did not rise from her seat.

"One crystal ball per table only, please _,_ " Professor Shearwater added airily, her eyes already on her paperwork, as two Ravenclaws bickered over one of the newer-looking crystals. "I'm sure you all remember how to share."

Perpetua glanced at Luna. "Do you want me to get us a crystal ball?" she murmured, starting to rise from her chair. Luna shook her head with a smile and lightly touched her friend's hand to stop her. "No, sit down. I'll get it." She made her way briskly to the wall, the crowd around the cabinets having thinned significantly. Remaining in the cabinet was a cloudy and suspiciously orange-tinted crystal ball, a respectable selection of teacups and knuckle-bones, and an age-spotted scrying-glass which looked as though it hadn't been dusted in a dragon's age. Luna instantly felt sorry for it and reached for the glass with eager fingers.

"Miss Lovegood, is it?" Professor Shearwater called from her desk. Luna glanced over, the darkened surface of the mirror already in her hands. "That's one of the damaged ones, I'm sorry to say. You'll have to take one of the crystal balls." The professor's red hair fell over one shoulder as she bent to attend to the parchments on her desk.

Luna frowned, disappointed, and glanced over to see that Orion Black had apparently taken possession of the last functional glass. With a sigh, she made to put hers back, but at the last moment hesitated, and instead carried it with her beneath the iffy-looking orange crystal as she made her way back to the table where Perpetua waited.

Upon noticing the scrying-glass Perpetua raised a quizzical brow but did not comment, instead focusing her attention on the crystal ball as Luna placed it on the stand in the centre of the table. Luna held the convex half-bubble of the mirror underneath the edge of the table, circling it with the palms of her hands, and watched it carefully as the lights of the classroom flickered in the black, distorted image it reflected. She had always had an easier time drawing images out of scrying-glasses than crystal balls; Professor Trelawney's obvious favouring of the latter had been disappointing, as Luna had typically found their results vaguer if admittedly far more frequent. Glancing out of the corner of her eye at the obnoxious hole-in-the-air that surrounded Riddle, she noted with interest that he had not chosen the glass himself and had instead allowed Black to take it; it had seemed obvious that he might wish to use it himself, given his dazzling competency in every kind of magic that she'd ever seen him demonstrate. He had evidently opted, however, to use one of the crystal balls instead, and was currently staring intently at it while Rosier yawned and fidgeted with his tie.

A sigh drew her attention back to her partner. "I can't see anything," Perpetua whined, flopping back in her chair.

Luna suppressed a giggle. "Perpetua, you haven't even tried! Come on."

The redhead tried to pout at her, but the expression transformed almost immediately into a rueful grin. She made a groaning noise and pulled her wild mane of hair over her face, making Luna laugh again. "I can't. All I see is me getting expelled."

"Don't be so dramatic," Luna chided, silver eyes wide with amusement. "Look —" She paused, thinking. "Just… make your mind like something old and silver opening up. Like a mirror."

Perpetua glared helplessly through her hair. "What does that mean?"

Luna sighed, trying to find a way to make her understand. "How… if you were to see your mind, or yourself maybe, as an object, what would it be?"

Perpetua paused. "A geode, I think," she said slowly, after a long pause. "I'm not sure why. But… appearances are deceptive. That feels like it suits me."

Luna hummed and tapped her lips with a finger. "All right. That makes a lot of sense. Now… how do you open a geode?"

Her friend looked perturbed. "Break it?"

Luna shook her head. "You can't do that with divination. What about if you put the geode in water? Over a very long time, water will gently break a rock. Isn't that true?"

"Erode a rock," Perpetua corrected, but Luna waved a hand impatiently. "Yes, I suppose."

"Imagine," said Luna, "you are taking the geode that is yourself and placing it underwater. In a rushing, bright river."

Perpetua hesitated, then closed her eyes. "I'm imagining," she mumbled.

"Now imagine the water speeding up. Imagine years passing. The geode grows smaller, its shell thins and becomes translucent."

"That's not how that works," Perpetua whispered, and Luna shushed her.

"The geode hasn't opened, but when it is small and fragile enough, you let the timestream slow and draw it out of the water. When you hold it against the light of the sun, you can just make out the shapes of the crystals, like when you can see sunlight through marble that's been sculpted very thin. That's what divination is; you just have to wear the walls thin enough to catch a glimpse. Do you see?"

Perpetua opened her eyes.

"Do you see?" Luna repeated, her excitement making her impatient. Her companion nodded slowly, the ghost of a smile dawning on her face.

"I think, maybe. That… still didn't make any sense, though. Do you know anything about how a geode forms?"

"No," said Luna merrily, fingering the edge of her scrying-glass. "Try again."

Perpetua took a deep breath and looked into her crystal ball, her gaze growing unfocused and soft. Something flickered in her face, and she met Luna's eyes again. Luna raised her eyebrows.

"I almost had… something," Perpetua said softly, her expression faintly stricken. "I'm not sure, though."

"That's all right," Luna said encouragingly. "Everybody starts out with fragments. What did you see?"

Perpetua was silent a moment. "I'm not really sure," she replied at last, eyes wandering to the side. "I don't know. Maybe it was nothing." Luna's brow creased in a slight frown, but she didn't press the issue.

The aura-hole behind her fluxed abruptly, making the skin of her back prickle, and Luna turned to look at Riddle. He had his face turned partway toward her, and had clearly been listening in on her conversation with Perpetua, though his body was angled such that he could reasonably claim innocence if she accused him of eavesdropping. She noted, with chagrin, that he was smiling.

The rest of the class period passed without incident. Luna did not use the scrying-glass.

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A/N: Bit of a shorter chapter this time around; I'm still adjusting to the massive amount of free time I have during the summer and figuring out how I'm going to factor writing into my schedule. Thank you all for your patience and support, I've gotten nothing but love from you guys and it's been completely amazing. 3 You have no idea how much I appreciate it.

A special note of thanks to Anduril on AO3, who was one of my earliest readers and has consistently sent lots of love and feedback. I adore reading your comments and I'm so glad you love the story as much as I do! Hope your summer is going wonderfully.

Look forward to the next update in a week or two! :) I love you guys! xo shai


	12. Chapter Twelve

Recommended soundtrack for this chapter: "Round We Go" by Marika Hackman, "Touch" by MAALA, "immortal" by Elley Duhé

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 **Chapter Twelve**

Having heard at breakfast that Perpetua had fallen ill the night before, Luna skipped nine-a.m. Divination on Friday; she therefore had the entire morning, and an hour or so of the afternoon, free to do with as she pleased. She spent most of it hanging round the library hoping to a) perhaps catch Marcus Selwyn hovering in the Restricted Section again and b) avoid Riddle, who she knew had class all morning on Fridays. Selwyn did in fact appear, but didn't do anything more than a benignly ineffectual amount of studying; Luna thought it was fairly possible he might have been researching for Riddle, but he looked bored enough to have been reading through the copious appendices of Bagshot's _A History of Magic_ , and accordingly lacked a certain amount of furtiveness of manner that she would have expected out of someone digging into the depths of forbidden magic in the middle of the library.

By 12:30, Luna had passed half her lunch hour watching Selwyn out of the corner of her eye, and was considering skipping her afternoon Transfiguration class. Professor Dumbledore, however, had deigned to cancel his classes all last week, ostensibly due to illness, making this her very first Transfiguration hour of the year; Luna at last decided, therefore, that she had better show up at least for today.

As she was heading out of the library, Luna spotted Cecily Harlowe flipping through a large tome in the Magical Theory section and looking rather perturbed. Luna trotted over, intending to say hello and maybe have a brief commiserating chat about the finer points of Bleckwyn's Theory of Aqualocative Energies, but she didn't get a chance to say anything before her friend looked up in a swish of blonde hair and preempted her.

"Oh! Luna. Hi. Do you think you could take a look at this?"

Luna leaned forward and peered at the book. A tangle of complex diagrams sprawled over the page Cecily was pointing to, demonstrating how the five greater subcategories of spells behaved in proximity to one another. "Why?" Luna wanted to know. "Are you having problems with it?"

Cecily shook her head, though seemingly not in disagreement. Her face was rueful. "I've never been good with this sort of thing. Practising magic is easy for me, but I never seem to be able to grasp the theory of it." She sighed and tapped her fingers on the spine of the book, evidently in thought. "I think what's confusing me is… here." She shifted the volume in her hands and moved to tap on the rightmost figure with a glossy fingernail. "Given the properties of transfigurative spells, and how much they mess with aqualocation and magnetism, wouldn't it make sense for a charm or hex to fail within a simultaneous proximity of five inches? I don't understand how they're supposed to still work. I mean, I _know_ they do, but according to this, they shouldn't, right?" She looked up at Luna, brow furrowed.

Luna hummed in response, scanning the diagram. "I'm not sure… oh, wait." She pointed to a footnote. "There, look. Charms have this exceptional property — they naturally re-orient their aqualocative energies around the nearest _stable_ body of water." She smiled at Cecily. "Unless you're farther away from water than it's strictly possible to be on Earth, all other things being equal, your charm will succeed."

Cecily grinned back and rolled her eyes. "Ugh. Thank you, Luna." She glared at the diagram. "I don't know why they insist on making us think through all these stupid hypotheticals. As if two spells have ever been cast at the exactsame time within a proximity of five inches. No witch or wizard is stupid enough to double-cast that close up. And there always has to be some time differential when two people cast spells, hasn't there? Incantations being variable in length and all?"

Luna just shrugged a shoulder in response, unsure of what to say. "Yes," she responded finally, "but that's not the point of magical theory. It's important to understand why things work, not just that they do."

Cecily squinted at her. "Are you sure you shouldn't be in Ravenclaw, Lovegood?"

Luna batted her lightly on the head with a book, laughing when Cecily yelped and ducked. "I'm late for class," she informed her friend airily and, with a wave, trotted out of the library.

Upon arriving at the Transfiguration classroom, Luna halted just outside the door. Professor Dumbledore was nowhere to be seen, despite the hour having started several minutes ago. Like most of the classrooms, the room was divided into tables rather than individual desks, with two students seated at each. Every seat was filled except for one: the right-hand seat at the table on the left wall. Sitting to the left of the empty seat was a dark-haired figure, surrounded by a prickling, hollow void of energy that Luna recognised instantly.

 _Oh, Cecily,_ she thought dizzily, trying to control the wave of anger, hurt and betrayal that was rising in her throat. In truth she had no way of knowing whether her friend had conspired with Riddle, but something told her it couldn't possibly be a coincidence. If not for Cecily getting her attention and keeping her talking, she would not have been late for class, and Riddle wouldn't have had time to arrange the seating of the room how he wanted so that she would be forced to sit with him. In retrospect, she probably shouldn't have been surprised that Riddle would end up trying to recruit Cecily, but that he'd evidently succeeded — and right under her nose, without her knowledge — felt like a knife in her gut nevertheless.

Luna steeled herself and took a breath, blinking back the hot tears that had begun to prick at her eyes and tightening her grasp on her book-bag. There was nothing to be done for it now; she couldn't simply turn around and leave class, not after she'd so obviously been standing in the doorway. She straightened, keeping her head high, strode over to the empty seat and seated herself quietly. As she was mentally debating whether to greet Riddle nonchalantly or do her best to ignore him, he beat her to the punch with a light tap on her hand and a ridiculously charming smile.

"Afternoon, Lovegood," he said cordially, and she tried furiously to maintain her composure as his absurd magnetism abruptly knocked the breath out of her lungs. _How in Merlin's name does he do that?_ she lamented, fighting a wave of combined annoyance and embarrassment as the smug look in his eyes told her he knew exactly the effect he was having. Luna averted her eyes, and after a moment was able to breathe and refocus.

She paused a moment, willed herself to forget her irritation, and allowed her usual dreamy smile and vacant expression to slide onto her face. _Remember why you're here, Luna._ "Hello, Tom Riddle," she said. "I must say, I'm a bit surprised to see you sitting by yourself. You seem to have so many good friends."

Riddle was not flustered by her pointing out the obviousness of his ploy, and simply exhaled briefly before smiling at her again, eyes intent. "I enjoy getting to know new people," he said merely. "Sometimes my friends would rather sit with each other, anyway." This she considered to be very probably true, but whether he actually knew it to be the case was more questionable. Voldemort's understanding of his followers' feelings toward him had never been entirely clear to her; as Tom Riddle, a figure who was less obviously invested in evoking fear in others and made at least a cursory effort to be charming, his thoughts on the matter were even more obscure.

Nevertheless, Luna smiled absently in response and did not argue. "Yes, I've… I can understand that," she amended mid-thought, surprising herself with the relatively genuine and unforced nature of her response. She paused, and continued, "You're a bit different, aren't you, Tom?"

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him recoil briefly in surprise. After a moment he seemed to bring himself back under control, and replied, "I suppose so, yes. Although it depends on what precisely you mean by different." His tone was even.

Luna opened her mouth to answer him, but was interrupted by a large orange shape soaring into the room over her shoulder, followed by the sound of footsteps and a pale ginger head ducking under the low doorframe; Professor Dumbledore, in company of Fawkes, had at last arrived. Luna suppressed a fond, involuntary smile.

"My apologies for keeping you all waiting for so long," said the professor mildly as he strode over to his desk. "I would fill you in on the nature of my erstwhile illness, but I fear the details would cause some of you rather painful nightmares, or at the very least some unnecessary vomiting. Let's jump back into the curriculum instead, shall we? A week is quite enough respite from Transfiguration for you, I think." With a flourish of his wand, a small hand mirror appeared on the tables in front of each of them. "Let's start with something fun."

Beside her, Luna heard Riddle scoff quietly. When she glanced at him, however, his face was perfectly neutral; only the harsh, flickering light in his eyes betrayed his disdain for the man in front of him.

"Mirrors," Dumbledore went on, "can reflect not only our physical appearance, but also our perception of the world around us. Now, don't be too intimidated; this is a warm-up exercise and a way for me to see how your transfigurative abilities have withstood a summer away from school, but it isn't a test. I want you to simply transfigure the mirror in front of you into something you see reflected in it. Any object of your choice will do." He stood there smiling for a moment, and then added, "Challenge yourselves, and work together if necessary." With this, he sat and regarded them, clearly expecting that they begin working without his having to direct them to do so. If he had noticed Luna's somewhat conspicuous proximity to Riddle, he did an excellent job of pretending the contrary. The classroom filled with the sound of murmured conferences and the rustling of pages as students hunted for the appropriate half-forgotten incantations in their textbooks.

"Any ideas?" Luna asked her partner quietly. He was clearly not enamoured of Dumbledore's teaching abilities or of the task set before them, but she was nevertheless curious to see what he chose.

Riddle was silent for a moment before responding. "Well, there's the obvious answer, of course," he said finally, "but I'm more interested in what you're going to do." He turned to smile at her, and Luna did her best not to be distracted by the ridiculous beauty of the expression, almost a tangible force in the space between them.

"Obvious answer?" she prompted, blinking away the dazzling glare and focusing on what he'd just said.

He shrugged offhandedly, but his eyes never left hers. "Yes, well it's a mirror, isn't it?" He paused, and then intoned with a wave of his wand, " _Fairea simulacrum."_

The mirror in front of Riddle grew and morphed into the form of a human, lying supine on the desk. As Luna watched, her reflection in the warped surface flickered and solidified into an image of skin, blonde hair, and silver eyes. The figure wore her face, her clothing, a frozen wide-eyed caricature of her typical expression of mild surprise. There were flowers in its hair.

Every eye in the room was on them, and Dumbledore stood from his seat at the front, stone-faced. Riddle was ignoring him, however; Luna could see him looking at her sidelong, waiting for her reaction.

It was clear to her that this was a display of power. He was not only showing off, but making it subtly obvious — to her, to the other students, and, most alarmingly, to Dumbledore — that she was of particular interest to him. He was not looking for an awed or flattered response from her; he wanted to see that she understood his real meaning, which was that no-one was going to stop him from getting whatever it was he wanted from her. He wanted fear, resignation, submission. Had he manipulated her seat in the room so as to show her this? Had he known what Dumbledore had been planning for the lesson that day?

Luna looked at him, and then at the empty-eyed copy on the desk. He was leaning over it, his hand suspended near its pale neck. The implication was clear, but he wouldn't be so bluntly threatening as to really touch it — would he?

For some reason the thought was unbearable, and before she knew it, her hand shot out to grab his where it hovered over the not-Luna. He glanced at her, seeming pleased at the panicked look in her eyes.

"It's — " she started, and then broke off, uncertain of what to say.

Before she could respond properly, however, Dumbledore's voice boomed behind her, " _Reparifarge._ " The copy melted and shrank back into the form of a mirror. For a moment, there was silence, and then the professor spoke again.

"You ought to know better than this, Tom," Dumbledore said quietly. "Ten points from Slytherin, and a roll of parchment on the _questionable_ ethics of simulacra, to be turned in by the beginning of next class."

"Of course, Professor," Riddle replied smoothly, inclining his head in an elegant mockery of contrition. Dumbledore, with a convincingly disinterested glance at Luna and a raised eyebrow at their still-joined hands, returned to his desk. Luna, abruptly conscious of her hand in his, withdrew it quickly and looked at him again. Riddle stared back, half-smiling.

"The flowers," she whispered hollowly, "were a nice touch." The half-smile broadened into a brilliant icy-eyed grin.

They did not speak for the remainder of the lesson, except for Luna to recite an incantation and turn her mirror into a moth, which was summarily burned to a crisp by a lantern on the wall. She tried not to see it as an omen.

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When Luna arrived back at the Slytherin dormitory that evening during dinnertime, she was greeted by the unexpected presence of three of her dorm-mates. Walburga, Carlotta, and Edith were sitting on the floor, forming a circle around a small bottle of mulled wine and an extravagant arrangement of fine cheeses. Walburga and Edith were both perched on cushions — Luna suspected Carlotta of offering, or being forced to offer, her own; she was the only one sitting on the bare floorboards, and the bed by the lake window was suspiciously bare of pillows. Nevertheless, Carlotta was giggling rather loudly at something one of them had said, with Walburga laughing along and even Edith smiling slightly. Luna hesitated briefly at the doorway, but was noticed quickly enough; at Walburga's too-wide smile of greeting and wine-bright eyes, she approached and settled on the floor between Carlotta and Edith.

"Good evening, Lovegood," said Walburga; Luna caught a mild slur in her words, well hidden behind her coldly aristocratic manner.

"Skipping supper?" asked Luna in a blasé tone, her eyes flicking inquisitively to the wine. She glanced at Edith, who seemed the only sober one of the three; the girl inclined her head slightly in the direction of Walburga.

"I thought I should reward these two for a job well done," Walburga explained airily. "They obtained something of mine which had been _temporarily appropriated_ by that Mudblood fool, Thornfield." Luna recognised the name of the castle's caretaker, who would one day be briefly succeeded by Apollyon Pringle, and later by the prickly Squib Argus Filch.

Mumbling quietly to her wand, Carlotta conjured a cup after a few tries and pushed it into Luna's hands with a conspiratorial smile. "We took some of his Firewhiskey, too," she stage-whispered, and tapped her heel on the floor. "I hid it under the floorboards." Luna found herself admiring the unusually happy, red-cheeked glow of Carlotta's expression. Walburga was evidently far friendlier when intoxicated than she was while sober, and Carlotta seemed to be taking full advantage of the situation to pretend that the two were, in fact, friends. Luna's heart twisted slightly at the thought, but she steadied herself; if Carlotta wanted to remain friends with a girl who abused or ignored her by turns in between brief periods of tolerance, it was no business of Luna's. This was a situation that she, too, could benefit from, she realized.

"Why just us girls, though?" Luna said, her lips parting slightly in a smile as she tapped her nose with a pale finger. "Aren't you friends with those handsome boys who hang around with Riddle? Rosier, Black, Lestrange — that lot?" At the mention of Evan Rosier's name, Carlotta stiffened unhappily, but the other two either failed to notice or pretended not to. Wishing to avoid the appearance of joining the conversation while suspiciously neglecting to join in the consumption of alcohol, Luna reached for the wine and poured herself a modest portion, resolving to keep a careful eye on how much she drank.

"Well, yes, of course," sighed Walburga, swirling the wine around in her cup and reaching for a piece of cheese. "But they are not in my good graces of late. My dear cousin Orion is surly because his best friend failed to inform him that he would not be in Defense Against the Dark Arts this term, and he has apparently elected to blame me for not filling him in sooner." This last was punctuated with an elegant snort. "The others are being ridiculously secretive these days. Honestly, don't they know we're all on the same — " She paused, evidently thinking better of finishing this thought, and delicately rephrased. "They needn't be quite so smug about it all." Privately, Luna thought it was likely rather astute of them to avoid giving Walburga any important intelligence about the doings of Riddle's inner circle, if she was this easy to get information out of.

"And it's not as though we'd invite Rosier anyway," Carlotta intoned, with a sniff that did not quite succeed in appearing dispassionate. "He's a prat. So are most of them, really." Walburga nodded sagely in agreement.

"What have the rest of them done?" Luna asked in unfeigned interest. Was there dissension in the ranks? Surely Riddle would attempt to quash such an obvious chink in the armour of his little personal army. But then, she was unsure how this sort of girls-only gossip would reach his ears anyway. Her eyes flicked briefly to Edith, who still hadn't spoken since Luna had entered the room, and then back to Carlotta.

The chubbier girl brightened, clearly pleased to have anybody's undivided attention, even that of a strange new housemate. "Well," she began a little theatrically, "it's not as though _all_ of them have committed some drastic crime against the virtue of the fair maidens of Slytherin house." She sniffed again. "Just most of them." Walburga cackled, and Edith's lips quirked in a ghost of a smile.

"So — besides Rosier," Luna prodded again, "who's the worst of the lot?"

"Nott," Carlotta said instantly, shuddering. "He's so creepy."

"Not as creepy as Lestrange," interjected Walburga with a look of distaste. "He looks at me like I killed his firstborn."

"If you want to ask about Riddle, Luna, there's no need to be so shy about it."

Another voice interrupted them from the doorway, and the other three looked up. Luna inhaled deeply and blew out her breath as quietly as she could, before turning to face the intruder. It was Cecily.

"Who said I wanted to know anything about Riddle?" she asked faintly, knowing she had already been caught out. There was no way she could turn the conversation to get anything useful out of the others now, not when Cecily had so blatantly pointed out her endgame.

Cecily smiled at her. "Oh, come on." She strode over and seated herself between Walburga and Edith, propping her chin on her hand. "It's obvious you're completely in love with him," she observed crisply. "Why else would you be _that_ curious about what he and his friends are up to?" Cecily's voice was friendly, but she was staring Luna down with a sharpness in her eyes that made her real meaning obvious. _Keep asking questions and see what happens._

"Fair enough," Luna replied lightly, staring back with a faint smile and suppressing her deep-seated desire to protest this insinuation. "I don't know if I'd use the phrase _in love_. But he's really _quite_ charming. Can I help it if I'm taken in just the teensiest bit?" She folded her hands and let her gaze grow distant, ostensibly to ruminate on Riddle's plethora of draws as a romantic prospect; in reality, her attention remained entirely focused on Cecily, anticipating her reaction.

Cecily looked disappointed, evidently having hoped that Luna's obvious distaste for Riddle would trip her up and cause her to say something that would expose her attempt at interrogation. "I wouldn't get your hopes up," she said tartly, eyes flashing. "He hasn't a taste for oddities, as far as my knowledge goes. You'd likely be better off with a spaceman — somebody more like you."

Luna blinked back the film of tears that rose unexpectedly in her eyes. She was used to ignoring this type of casual, cutting insult from strangers and acquaintances, but not from friends; and while her mind had already accepted that Cecily was no longer her friend, her heart was apparently lagging a bit behind. _There's no need to be nasty, Cecily,_ she heard Walburga protesting, and choked back a bitter laugh. So Walburga, Sirius Black's razor-tongued and black-hearted mother, would defend her, while Cecily plunged the knife into her back and twisted? There was irony.

After a moment, she collected herself. _Don't be so dramatic,_ she chided internally. _Pull yourself together. You knew you weren't here to make friends._ Irritated with herself, she blinked away another wave of tears and met Cecily's eyes, her lips twisting into an unhappy imitation of a smile that was closer to a grimace. "Maybe you're right," she replied at last. "I ought not to fly quite so close to the sun. A girl can dream, though, can't she?" Her high voice, pitched higher in her distress, wavered slightly, and she cut herself off.

Cecily scoffed, lines of tension bracketing her mouth. "It's all you ever do anyway," she retorted in an unreadable tone, reaching for the bottle. Luna gave a brittle laugh, in something resembling agreement, and retreated from the circle to her bed. There she could hide under the covers, and be who she was, and pity herself a little while in peace.

She heard the others continue talking for a long time before she drifted off to sleep.


	13. Chapter Thirteen

Recommended soundtrack for this chapter: "Horseshoe Crab" by Slothrust, "Bitter Fruit" by The Kills

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 **Chapter Thirteen**

Luna awoke to an empty dormitory. The time told her she had risen miraculously early for her relatively late night, as she still had enough time to have breakfast and get ready for morning Arithmancy. Given this, her absent Slytherin housemates appeared either to have risen sometime before dawn or not to have gone to bed at all; Luna mentally filed this away as something to investigate later, and slowly levered herself out of bed. Mercifully, it appeared she had not had enough wine the previous night to land herself with a hangover, and had escaped with a — moderate, she judged after swallowing once or twice, case of dry mouth. After doing a few exercises designed to return proper magical function to the hands, just for conscientiousness' sake, Luna quietly charmed some water to spray into her mouth and swished it around for a couple of seconds before swallowing. As usual, the conjured water tasted of sulphur and just slightly of mouldering almonds, but it did the job nevertheless, and her throat and mouth felt much better.

This done, Luna quickly dressed herself and headed off to the Great Hall to eat before class. To her delight, Euphemia, Fleamont and Everett were sitting at the Gryffindor table, and waved her over to eat with them. After the events of last night, as it turned out, a little while laughing with her friends over eggs and toast and complaining about Professor Kettleburn's enthusiasm for lengthy essays was exactly what she needed. When nine-a.m. rolled around, Luna found herself reluctant to leave her friends, and decided on impulse that she could stand to miss one more hour of Arithmancy without her marks suffering too badly. When Euphemia met her eyes and glanced meaningfully at the clock, brows raised, Luna simply shook her head, and Euphemia subsided without comment.

The four of them lingered at the breakfast table for another three-quarters of an hour, before very slowly meandering their way over to Charms class with Professor Mulciber. The man was stocky and of average height, with curly, greying dark hair and faintly squinting eyes, which were assisted by a pair of round spectacles. He was unusually quiet for a Charms professor. Luna had learned from Euphemia at the beginning of term, going off prefect gossip, that Professor Mulciber was estranged from the rest of the Mulciber family, that the schism was complicated and at least partially against his will, and that he knew that a young nephew of his was to attend Hogwarts soon but was unsure of the boy's exact age. As there had been no such child in the Sorting ceremony at the beginning of term, Fleamont had added softly, Professor Mulciber would have to wait at least another year before he would be able to see a member of his own family. Awareness of this depressing fact was evident in the professor's subdued demeanour and rather dim aura, but despite these he nevertheless managed to teach Charms passably well, in Luna's estimation. This class period was not one of his greatest hits, but Luna did manage to refine her wand motions for Banishing Charms based upon his advice.

The remainder of the morning and the first hour of the afternoon were also spent with her friends, collaborating over homework and competing to see who could conjure the most brightly-coloured birds, as Luna did her best to avoid thinking about anything that mattered. Her period of respite ended too quickly, and she was forced to part ways with the other three at five minutes to one, so as to arrive on time to Defence Against the Dark Arts.

Almost immediately following her arrival at the doorway of the Defence classroom, Luna was struck by the impression that the room had grown larger. Some of that, she recognised, was probably related to the fact that the rows of desks that normally lined the floor were nowhere to be seen. Those students who had already arrived were clustered in front of Professor Merrythought's desk, chatting quietly as they waited for class to begin. Luna noted that Cecily and Walburga were standing at Riddle's shoulder, towards the right side of the room. Edith Selwyn was not with them; Luna spotted her loitering near the back of the throng, looking bored and ignoring the occasional glance from Walburga. After a moment of consideration, she went to stand at a measured distance away from Edith; a part of her wanted to just talk to the other girl, but she knew that now wasn't the best time to do so.

Professor Merrythought looked up from her paperwork, saw Luna standing in the back, and scanned the room briefly in what was evidently a headcount. When she finished, she stood up and smiled her characteristic wolf-spider smile. "Hello there, class. It looks like we're all here, finally." Luna was a bit needled by this; after all, she'd only been a minute late. When she took a moment to look round again, however, it did appear that the entirety of the class, excluding her, had arrived fairly early. Was there something particularly special about today's lesson that she might have forgotten?

Her unvoiced question was answered almost as quickly as she'd thought it. "Today is indeed that long-awaited day," the professor intoned, her solemn tone dripping with irony. "Yes, indeed. The day you all get to finally release all that pent-up aggression and do your damnedest to inflict each other with the most creative of _non-fatal_ injuries. I'm understood, am I not?" She stared at them all through her tinted spectacles, and Luna nodded along with her classmates, suppressing a smile. Professor McGonagall would have _loved_ her. "Good. I'm sure you all remember the basics we went over on Thursday. Now, rather than allow you to choose your own partners, I have deigned to place you all into pre-assigned pairs." She raised a hand at the scattering of groans that rose in reply. "Yes, yes, it's all very terrible. My primary goal in this class, however, aside from teaching you, is ensuring your relative safety. I have put each of you with a partner who should be fairly close to your skill level, according to my own guesswork. This way, fate willing, none of you will end up jinxed into the beyond because your opponent has bothered to spend an extra moment or two practising their Reflecting Charms and you have not. It's for your own good, the end, no arguments, no appeals." Her smile widened. "Is that clear?" Riddle stayed silent this time. A dutiful echo of _yes, Professor_ spread through the crowd of students. Merrythought inclined her head briefly, apparently satisfied. "All right, then. Listen carefully, because your partners are as follows, and I am _not_ repeating the entire list for every lackwit who would rather focus on gossiping about your little weekend escapades." She fluttered her fingers at them, blithely ignoring the fact that the room had been entirely gossip-free since she'd started speaking. The Slytherins might play along with Riddle's passive-aggressive taunts, Luna reflected, but they wouldn't dare mutter under their breath to each other, not in this class. Professor Merrythought breathed in deeply and began running through the names.

"Evan Rosier and Thaddeus Spectre. Edith Selwyn and Walburga Black. Rabastan Lestrange and Pallas-Athena Quirrell. Evelyn Fitzwallace and Helen Orlaith. Jade Collins and Vanya Dolohov…"

Luna listened with trancelike intensity as Merrythought went down the list, exhaling shortly in relief and letting her shoulders slump when Riddle was named alongside Abraxas Malfoy. When she finally heard her own name, it felt so sudden that she came awake with a start: _Luna Lovegood and Orion Black_... Well. Perhaps it wasn't the ideal scenario exactly, but Black seemed disinterested enough that duelling him likely wouldn't cause her any problems. As Merrythought directed them all to stand at marked spots on the floor that were each a yard-and-a-half or so apart, Luna began mentally laying out her strategy for the next forty-five minutes. She planned to avoid anything conspicuous or flashy, and needed to balance her spellwork carefully; it wouldn't do to make an enemy out of Black by winning too quickly, but then, she also didn't wish to seem a pushover by giving him an easy victory. Possibly she could play off of the Slytherins' perception of her as odd and dim-witted by ignoring the assignment altogether or using spells that she simply liked rather than those that were useful; several years ago, she might have followed that course without a second thought and done whatever she wanted. _No_ , Luna concluded: the time for such frivolous deceptions was long past. It might be easier for her to follow her instincts and go back to happily ignoring the reactions of everyone around her, but however simpler that might seem, it would only set her efforts back in the long term. She couldn't afford to waste time.

Eventually, Luna settled on a simple defensive strategy. It occurred to her, in a brief and wry flash of insight, that she had once told Ron she'd never won a game of Wizards' Chess, and that it had been true.

Across from her, Black was moving into the standard duelling stance and shaking his black hair out of his eyes. His gaze was flat and impenetrable as it focused on her, and his expression reminded Luna inexplicably of Walburga, although the girl standing on the other side of the room seemed rather dissimilar to him in personality. His cousin was as histrionic and mercurial as Orion was stoic and close-mouthed; however, the two of them shared a kind of gracefully cruel air about their persons that made Luna shudder almost as much as Riddle's unsettlingly hollow charisma. Luna had little time to wonder if Walburga would one day be a favourite of her fanatical young niece before Merrythought gave the starting signal and the students bowed to each other. To her surprise, however, Black did not immediately begin attacking her; he seemed preoccupied with something, and after a moment Luna realised he was busy blocking a flurry of misaimed spells from somewhere to their right. His eyes flicked back to Luna, glinting with evident irritation, but he merely inclined his head at her and summoned a tangle of ribbons that flung themselves forward toward her legs. Luna made short work of incinerating them, although it took her a frustratingly long, adrenalin-spiked two seconds to remember the proper incantation. When she looked up, Black was lying sprawled on the floor, several steps back from his mark, and glaring furiously in the direction from which the misaimed spells had come a moment ago. Luna followed his gaze; it was Abraxas Malfoy, who was standing calmly in his duelling stance with his eyes on Riddle, across from him. As she watched, Black sat up and cast an enraged and probably ill-advised Full Body-Bind Curse at Malfoy, who handily blocked it before shooting a spray of emerald-coloured vipers back at him. Luna fell out of her stance and glanced at Riddle, hoping she wouldn't regret it.

He had been staring at her. He now smiled invitingly, with an apologetic roll of his eyes at Malfoy, and inclined his head toward an empty space toward the end of the line of students. The spot was on the far side of the room from Merrythought, and also happened to be large enough for two duellists to test each other's mettle with relative freedom. After a moment, Riddle abandoned his place and moved swiftly to the empty area. Luna glanced at the professor, who apparently hadn't noticed anything out of the ordinary, and followed to stand across from him. The gleam of triumph she saw when she met his eyes irked her, but she consoled herself with the knowledge that she was about to get a chance to vent her emotions in the most direct way possible.

He bowed to her, his smile turning ironic. Luna, never taking her eyes from his, bowed in return. Without warning, he moved like water into Morgana's Primary Offensive, a highly aggressive duelling posture that called for several weak spells cast in succession, followed by a higher-tier spell and a Shield-Shatter Curse that, in theory, would leave the target vulnerable for several seconds. Thinking quickly, Luna fell into a favoured posture of hers called Pyrrha's Triangle, a strategy that utilised a combination of Arithmantic properties of angles and quick-fire stabilising spells to guard against an especially forceful offence; the posture would have been too impractical to maintain had she been duelling a more restrained opponent, but Riddle was evidently going to play this one true to form. It didn't surprise her that he'd chosen such a strong posture for the opening move of a duel, but she was half-bemused, half-impressed that he practised proper duelling form at all. Very few Hogwarts students thought of duelling as anything more than an over-formal fistfight, and even Luna hadn't had the idea to study advanced duelling techniques until after the first time she'd been forced to go head-to-head with a Death Eater. Then again, she supposed that such an arcane school of knowledge would fit in rather neatly with his highly romanticised self-concept.

His first barrage of spells failed to make much more than a dent in her shielding. She saw a glint of appreciation in his eyes at her evidently well-chosen defence, but he wasted no time in switching tactics; the Pendragon Pentacle was his next choice, a series of hexes cast in a unique area-of-effect pattern that was tricky to get right, but if executed correctly would substantially weaken any non-offensive spells cast from her position on the floor unless she moved either much closer to him or much farther away. Distantly, Luna remarked upon his evident affinity for Arthurian-era postures. Did he see himself as King Arthur, or as Mordred?

As the duel progressed, she had increasingly little time for such wayward imaginings. He kept her guessing constantly, moving from highly advanced spellwork to the most basic of tactics seemingly at random, but always returning to the offensive. Luna, in turn, kept a careful eye on his duelling attitudes, which usually managed to give away his next move by a split-second. Once or twice he managed to feint between postures quickly enough to fool her, but he never broke through her defences for long enough to land a winning strike. About thirty minutes in, Luna realised with some perturbation that she was being forced to rely more and more heavily on Pyrrha's Triangle to avoid being hit by his stronger offensives. Evidently he had zeroed in on her partiality toward the strategy and was attempting to use it against her; the Triangle was useful against attack postures like those he'd been using early on in the duel, but it was exhausting to cast in succession, and doing so made it very difficult to recover into a respectable offence.

Luna was attempting to choose between two different strategies that might allow her to avoid his spells for long enough to re-establish her ground, when the decision was abruptly taken from her. Evidently getting impatient, Riddle abandoned his fine technique and blasted her with three curses: two extremely quick shots that would force her to abandon her Triangle in favour of a lighter and faster defence, and one more to break through that defence and throw her bodily — and rather painfully, if her assessment was correct — across the room, thus ending the duel. Moving without thought, Luna blocked the first two spells, sidestepped the third, blinked away a sudden image of round taped-up spectacles and green eyes, and called out clearly with a flourish of her wand, " _Expelliarmus_." She reflexively caught the bit of wood that sailed through the air toward her hand without processing immediately what it was.

After an instant, she blinked. She was holding two wands, and Riddle was glaring at her with such intensity that he could probably fry an egg or two if she could manage to get a skillet in front of him, and somebody was shouting that it was _Enough!_

Shaking slightly, Luna crossed the stretch of floor between herself and Riddle and presented him politely with his wand. He repossessed it quickly, with a slight contact against her hand, and when she looked at his face, it had regained its usual cast of calm politeness. "I know you don't like me, Lovegood," he murmured, "but it really is a shame. I would so appreciate the chance to further our acquaintance."

Luna's lips quirked in answer, but she didn't get the chance to verbalise a reply; Professor Merrythought was marching up to them, frowning mightily over her tinted spectacles. "Well," the professor said in a clipped undertone when she reached them, "that was, indeed, rather spectacular. While I'm sure we have all benefited a _great_ deal from the two of you showing off, I trust you will both stick to your assigned partners next time, hm?"

"Yes, Professor," replied Luna softly, breaking eye contact with Riddle to meet her teacher's gaze. "Of course." She was, after all, the one who had followed him to the empty spot in the line, even if it had been his idea to start with. He made some relatively noncommittal noise of assent, earning a glare from Merrythought before she stalked back to her desk.

Merrythought released class a few minutes early, complaining of a headache. On her way out of the room, Luna was stopped by a tall, startlingly pale figure with silver hair: Abraxas Malfoy. He was smiling at her a bit repellently, despite his angular good looks, and he leaned casually against the wall as he spoke. "Hello there, Lovegood," he said. "I've been thinking — we seventh years are doing independent study, you know, and we're supposed to be researching something that interests us, something that might benefit the magical community at large." The smile grew; his canines were much too long. "You interest me."

At Luna's failure to respond, he dropped the expression and went on. "As far as my knowledge goes, nobody has ever heard of anything like your resistance to the Imperius Curse. With your consent, I'd like to do some testing of your abilities — see how far they extend, from where they might originate, how they might be taught, and so on. Would you be willing to help me?" The smile returned, a bit more controlled this time. Luna blew out her breath quietly. She disliked Malfoy, it was true; she couldn't exactly pinpoint the reason why, but he seemed somehow far more _serpentine_ — disingenuous, she supposed — than his admittedly troubled grandson. Even Riddle's patently obvious insidiousness aggravated her less than… than whatever this was. In spite of that, however, she could see no real reason to disagree. Perhaps Malfoy's research might help her to learn more about why she had this ability, and if not, she wasn't risking anything more than some wasted hours with an irritating young aristocrat.

"Fine," she said at last, meeting his eyes briefly.

"Next Saturday, we'll begin?" he prodded, watching her carefully.

Luna nodded, forced a small smile, and swiftly made her escape. She had a free hour before Care of Magical Creatures, and she meant to spend it in the library, preferably alone.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

 _Monday, September the 13th, 1943. 2:45 pm._

 _She beat me, the little bitch. — I was angry enough at her victory that I was almost ready to try something wandless, before I remembered where we were._

 _It's annoying, frankly. At every turn, she does something else that I fail to anticipate. I keep trying to handle her the way I would handle any other student who might cause me trouble, but she is unfailingly obstinate. Evidently I must consider switching tactics. I might be able to play off of her reactions to my baser magnetisms; those, at least, I can be sure of, judging by the results of my efforts last Friday and a few little nothings that have reached my ear thanks to Cecily (and, later, Walburga, who was apparently expecting to be rewarded for providing me with out-of-date information. I corrected that supposition quickly enough). I shall look toward alternative possibilities for either gaining her favour or her terror in the future — I suspect I'll have to lean to the side of favour, as it seems she doesn't scare easily. But if we happen to cross wands again, she should not expect a repeat of today's outcome!_

 _Moving to a less aggravating topic: An interesting new development has been brought to my attention of late. Several days ago Nott, in his enigmatic little habit of sneaking out and wandering the forest after dark, came upon something quite unusual. It was, in truth, a dramatic enough discovery to sufficiently distract me from the humiliation of my defeat. He expressed to me that he had wished to ascertain the nature of the thing before informing me of it, in explanation for his tardiness, but I was too caught up in the fascinations of his find to deal with him as severely as I otherwise might have._

 _I will not write of it yet; not until I have learned a little more, but I expect I will need to put Selwyn's and my regular research on hold for the time being, while I investigate this new element._

 _I am beginning to suspect that it will bring me into the orbit of even greater powers._

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A/N: Hi, everyone! Sorry for the unexpected wait on this chapter; thank you all very much for being so patient. A bit more bad news: since school is starting up again relatively soon, updates will probably not be more frequent than about once or twice a month. Don't worry, though – even when I don't update quickly, or when my writing stalls, I never stop thinking about this fic. (i'm 100% serious, it's to the point of being weird, lol)

Thank you all so much for reading, and don't forget to leave me your comments! I love nothing more than to hear from you. :) xo shai


	14. Chapter Fourteen

Recommended soundtrack for this chapter: "Perth" by Bon Iver, "Amenamy (Jon Hopkins Remix)" by Purity Ring

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 **Chapter Fourteen**

Over the next week, Luna was able to set aside a few free moments to conference with Yancy, filling him in on the duel and Malfoy's proposition for the independent study. He seemed concerned that Riddle had engaged with her so directly, but agreed upon her explanation of the situation that the independent study would likely not do any harm. "But remember," he added in an urgent tone when their time was winding down, "anything Malfoy knows, he'll know too. Be careful what you say to him."

"You don't have to tell me," she replied, the ghost of a grimace on her face. "Thanks, Yancy."

When Saturday came around again, Luna arrived at the agreed-upon time in a disused classroom on the fourth floor. A man she didn't recognise was sitting at a desk in the centre of the room, bespectacled and boyish-faced, although his youthful looks clashed with his greying hair. As soon as she entered, he looked up from the parchment on his desk and stood to greet her.

"Hello there. Miss Lovegood, I presume?" At her uncertain nod, he went on, "Pleased to meet you. Findlay Auerbach." His smile was warm, his voice faintly accented. "I'm a Fringe and Experimental Magics researcher from the Ministry. Mr. Malfoy here" – he inclined his head sideways, and Luna abruptly noticed the silver-haired boy's bizarrely unobtrusive presence in the corner of the room – "has enlisted my temporary assistance in his independent study. So I'm going to be asking you a few questions, and he'll just sit over there and take your answers down, if that's all right." He looked at her closely for a moment as she took the seat across from him, evidently looking for any signs of indecision or unease.

"Why doesn't he ask them himself?" Luna pressed, half-reluctantly, with a glance at the student in question; she was instantly more comfortable with Auerbach than she would have been alone with Malfoy, but the question seemed relevant.

"Legal reasons, I'm afraid," said Auerbach apologetically. "Mr. Malfoy is underage, as are you, and the Ministry's taken an interest in your study. It's just for this once, as long as we're looking at your background. He's not qualified to conduct this kind of interview himself." At the words _taken an interest_ and _your_ _background_ Luna had to force herself not to freeze up, but Auerbach seemed to her to be perfectly businesslike and genuine, so she did her best to relax.

He noticed her discomfort, however. "Don't worry," he assured her. "This isn't an interrogation, and you're free to decline to answer any question you're uncomfortable with. Purely for research purposes." He smiled. "Acceptable?"

Luna smiled involuntarily back, feeling her tension ease. He really was very nice, disarmingly so. It was difficult to remain on edge when he was in the room with her. "Yes, of course."

"Now," began the researcher, pushing up his spectacles, "I wanted to start off with some simple questions about your personal history. Where are you from?"

Luna briefly mulled over the idea of lying, but she didn't see any harm in telling the truth. "Close to Ottery St. Catchpole. It's in Devon."

Auerbach wrote this down — as did Malfoy, she noted out of the corner of her eye. "Any abnormal magical expression as a child, or stronger than usual accidental magic?"

"Not really," she hedged. Her accidental magic had been a little unusual — more empathic and clairvoyant episodes as opposed to telekinetically knocking cooking utensils off countertops or making things vanish — but it wasn't outside the realm of the expected, as far as she knew. Auerbach scrutinised her briefly, then nodded and scribbled on his parchment.

"Any contact with a Class Four or Five magical creature of any kind?"

"No." This was also written down before Auerbach paused and looked back up at her.

"It's my understanding that both your parents are deceased. Is that true?" His eyes were kind. Luna nodded slowly, avoiding the impulse to look for a reaction from Malfoy when his aura spiked into her field of vision. She wasn't sure if his face would show pity or neutrality, but neither seemed preferable.

"What were their occupations?"

She considered this question for a moment. There wasn't any _Quibbler_ in 1943, but she didn't have to mention it by name. "My father was an independent journalist, and my mother was a fringe spellcrafter." Pandora had had access to a research grant from the Ministry, actually, but Luna refrained from mentioning that, as naturally no such grant would show up in any records Auerbach tried to access.

His brows rose. "I see. Do you think your mother's work could have had anything to do with you developing these… abilities?"

Luna opened her mouth to reply, then closed it again. "You still don't know how Imperius works, do you?" she blurted in realisation, before she could stop herself. "Your division, I mean. You're still trying to research it."

Auerbach inclined his head in not-disagreement, his lips quirking. "That's correct. All three Unforgivable Curses are highly enigmatic, theoretically speaking. One of the primary areas of interest of my Department." He didn't say the full phrase _Department of Mysteries_ , but the weight he placed on the word made it impossible not to comprehend. Luna's mind flashed back to the shifty research she knew had been going on in the Department in the nineties, and she looked at the man in front of her warily.

"Does this have anything to do with that?" she questioned, trying to keep her voice neutral, though her naturally high tone still made her sound a little accusatory.

He opened his hands. "Trust me, Miss Lovegood, your responses today — not to mention your abilities — will not be used for any kind of nefarious purpose." His voice was gentle, but tinged with tragedy, and she noted for the first time a certain hardness about his bronze-gleaming aura that somehow made her believe that he meant what he was saying. "We're only trying to understand, not to repurpose the Unforgivable Curses in any way. Do you believe me?"

After a moment, she told him that she did.

"Will you tell me about your mother? We can stop whenever you need to."

Luna took a breath, memories washing up in her mind like the sea on sand. She didn't want Riddle to know everything about how her mother had died; she couldn't have said why exactly, just that… he shouldn't. How much had she told Harry about what had happened? And she had trusted Harry.

"She was… experimenting," Luna said at last, speaking slowly. "Like she usually did. It was a project she'd been working on for a while. It went wrong, and she died." She considered adding, _that's all_ , but she didn't want to lay it on too thick.

Auerbach was silent for a moment, and she could see he was debating whether to press the topic further. Finally he settled on, "Did you know the spell's intended use?"

"No," she replied, voice even, eyes meeting his easily. Another slippery silver lie, twining around her head like a snake, but she paid it no heed.

Her efforts were gratified when he sighed and said, "All right. I suppose it's difficult to go any further here, then." He ran a hand through his hair and adjusted his spectacles again before glancing at Malfoy and beginning to pack up his things. "It's unclear to me how much your background might have been a factor in you developing these abilities. Without some insight into what kind of spell your mother was working on, that path is a dead end" — from the apologetic look that flashed into his eyes after the phrase left his mouth, he regretted that choice of words — "and there's not a guarantee that it would tell us anything even if we did know more. Mr. Malfoy, I'm going to end my inquiry here. I'd recommend the two of you look into trying other kinds of will-altering or compulsive type magic on Miss Lovegood, mainly potions — Veritaserum, Amortentia, that sort of thing — and see if her resistance extends past the Imperius. Some further study before you go there, Malfoy, might not go amiss," he added over his shoulder as he rose.

"It was lovely to meet you, Mr. Auerbach," Luna said politely, observing the way his sharp-edged aura flared behind his head like a star. He grinned back at her.

"And you as well, Miss Lovegood. You are a fascinating case, if I may say so. I wish you both the best of luck in your studies." On his way out, he added to her under his breath, "If he starts behaving like a cad, you have every right to abandon the study." Luna hid a smile and gave a tiny, nearly imperceptible nod.

After Auerbach was gone, Malfoy too rose from his seat in the corner. "Very interesting," he said softly, his gaze unfocused. Luna frowned at him, half-expecting to have to fend off more of the repulsive flirtatiousness from last week, but there was nothing in his eyes beyond simple curiosity and calculation. A moment later, he looked at her again. "Is this time every Saturday convenient for you?"

She twisted the ring on her first finger, one her father had given her almost a year ago now. "I suppose so. Where are we going to start next time?"

He inclined his head in thought. "Probably more questions," he admitted, with a brief, neutral look at her. "I know they're likely a little tedious, but I still need to know more about how you experience the Curse so we can see how it measures up to the alternatives, and it might tell us a something about how it works. Does that sound all right to you?" It was impossible to tell from his tone if her response would make any difference.

All the same, she answered with a slightly distant, "Yes," and, "I'll see you in a week, then."

He nodded. "Until then, Miss Lovegood."

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

An hour later, Luna was sitting with Perpetua by a window in a first-floor corridor as the two of them watched the rain.

"How do you think it's going to play out?" Perpetua asked, her eyes on the heavy grey sky outside. "The study, I mean." She glanced at Luna, who shook her head.

"I really don't know. It might end up being helpful, it might not. Given that I didn't really trust Malfoy enough to be completely honest today, I'm not sure that taking on the study with him was the right move, but I suppose there's no harm in going on with it."

The other girl frowned quizzically. "Trust him? How do you mean?"

Luna tapped her fingers on the window pane. She still hadn't told Perpetua about her ongoing cold war with Riddle. "The questions were — a little too personal." She inhaled a little more sharply than she'd intended, and then said, "They were about my mother."

"Oh," said Perpetua softly. She looked conflicted, but then asked, "Do you want to talk about it?"

"I don't know. I suppose." Luna sighed. "My mum was a spellcrafter, you know?" She looked up, seeking confirmation, and Perpetua nodded. "She was working on dimensional rifting."

Perpetua's eyes went wide. "Really. She must have been very clever."

Luna nodded, a little miserably. "As far as I know, to this day, there hasn't been a dimensional rifting spell approved for use by the Ministry. They're all too unstable, and my mother's was no exception — she wanted to find a way to tie a rift to spatiotemporal numerical identity."

Perpetua clapped a hand over her mouth. "Oh, no! Oh, but that's _so_ brilliant — for timeline jumping?"

Luna gave a small, watery smile, her vision blurring. "Yes. The spell failed, though. It ripped holes all through her body, and she bled out in twenty minutes."

Perpetua scooted across the sill to hug her. "I'm so sorry," she mumbled into Luna's shoulder. Luna buried her face in Perpetua's tangle of red hair for a moment, blinking back her tears, and then sniffed and drew away.

"It's okay. It was a long time ago." But Perpetua was still frowning. Taking a guess, Luna asked, "What's your mother like?"

It was Perpetua's turn to blink rapidly, and laugh a little. "She's an inventor, too. Very clever, just like your mum. But she's never been much of a mother to me, for all she named me after herself." Her smile turned bitter. "I don't know. I've never really been able to figure her out."

Luna grimaced commiseratively. "I know what that's like. That's how I feel about… most people." It was something she'd come to realise over the course of several years. She could recognise things about them from a distance, very clearly as it turned out, but when it came down to actually talking to people — well. Most of her friends weren't put off her strangeness and allowed her to fit in, but if they didn't, she wouldn't. Not easily, anyway.

Perpetua laughed again now, genuinely, slapping Luna lightly on the arm. "Don't say that! You seem to understand me well enough."

"But you're special," Luna admitted unthinkingly. _Like Harry_. Perpetua smiled at her again, a little shyly, but a moment later her smile slipped.

"Special," she echoed. "I keep hearing that word."

Luna just watched her, waiting for her to elaborate.

Perpetua met her eyes briefly, then took a deep, heavy breath and stared out the window again. "I don't know. It makes me think of what happened last year. They were the opposite of special, you know? All perfectly ordinary. But they were the last people who would've deserved what happened."

"Who?" asked Luna, baffled, but with a creeping sense that she wouldn't want to hear what her friend was about to say.

Perpetua looked at her, shocked. "Didn't you know? Nobody told you?" At Luna's shake of her head, she covered her mouth with her fist and huffed out another deep breath before meeting Luna's eyes again. "Last year, three students were found dead."

Luna blinked, her mind suddenly racing back to that night just over two weeks ago, at the start of term. She'd heard the other Slytherin girls talking about something of the kind, hadn't she? How could she have possibly forgotten?

"Two fourth-year boys," Perpetua went on quietly, "and a girl. Michael Parish, Jonathan Quinn, and Myrtle Warren. They all died under mysterious circumstances, here at Hogwarts. Dippet was talking about shutting down the school."

"What happened?" inquired Luna numbly, but Perpetua shook her head, her curls falling over her shoulder.

"Nobody really knows. It was like they just — dropped dead. Parish and Quinn were in one of the hallways on the second floor, and Warren was in the bathroom." She was silent for a moment. "Parish and Quinn were best friends. A Slytherin and a Hufflepuff, both Muggle-born. They were like brothers, as far as anybody could tell. Always laughing, always so kind to each other.

"I was never sure that it was… really an accident, with Warren. I knew her, you see — she was a Ravenclaw. She'd been bullied rather horribly by this sixth year Olive Hornby, who just transferred out at the end of last term. Warren was so shy, and she seemed so miserable — I thought maybe… Well, there are supposed to be safeguards against — that sort of thing. In the school. But there must be ways to get around them, and she was clever." Perpetua began to cry. "I keep thinking that I should have done something. I could have helped her."

"You don't know that," Luna reminded her dully, her voice soft. "and anyway, it isn't your fault. _You_ needn't feel guilty." If the other girl noticed the peculiar emphasis, she gave no sign of it.

So, there it was. Riddle was a killer already. And if he'd already killed Myrtle Warren, that meant he had murdered his father and grandparents over the summer as well. Why hadn't she come back the previous year, again? Why 1943? Ron's voice echoed in her head —y _ou picked this year because it's the year he's your age…_

Luna stifled a sob in her elbow, hoping the still-teary Perpetua wouldn't notice. She might as well have killed those students herself. _It wasn't my fault. I didn't know…_

But she knew she could have.

Tomorrow was Hermione's birthday. What would Hermione do? She would fix it, solve the problem.

 _This isn't over. I can still do it._ She hugged Perpetua tighter.

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A/N: Hi guys! Sorry about the wait on this one, it's been a tough semester. I know this chapter is a little shorter than usual, but I hope it was still enjoyable. We're about halfway through our first story arc at this point, so I'd say maybe seven or so more chapters before we start winding down this one and move on to the second phase of the story. Thanks for sticking with me & don't forget to leave a comment and let me know your thoughts! :)

(I know this scene probably feels a little similar to one we had a few chapters ago: the stakes go up, Luna feels the urgency of the situation and resolves to do her job... but for some reason, when the rubber hits the road, she just can't bring herself to do it. Looks like our boy isn't the only one not emotionally ready for a bumpy redemption arc, huh?) xo shai


	15. Chapter Fifteen

Recommended soundtrack for this chapter: "You Missed My Heart" by Phoebe Bridgers

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 **Chapter Fifteen**

Her next meeting with Abraxas Malfoy took place on the twenty-fifth of September, the following Saturday. They met in the same classroom, but he'd conjured two rather nice-looking chairs for the both of them, stationed across from one another and a few feet apart. Evidently he'd noticed her reluctance to be close to him physically, but he didn't seem bitter about it; when she came in he was sitting calmly in one of the chairs, looking more at ease than she'd ever seen him.

"Good afternoon, Lovegood," he said cordially. "Are you ready to begin?" At her nod, he actually smiled and gestured for her to sit.

"You said you'd be asking me more questions today," Luna prodded gently after a brief period of silence.

"Ah. Yes, of course." He leaned forward a little, and Luna was surprised that she didn't have to force herself not to move away; his presence wasn't nearly as offensive as it had been that day after class. "I thought we might focus today on the actual process of your resistance to the Imperius, to see if I might get a better picture of how you're doing it. Can you describe your experience to me? Do you remember it?"

"I do," she said unthinkingly, and stopped when she realised she could have just claimed she hadn't. But, she reminded herself, she'd accepted the risk of Riddle finding out more about her abilities with the possible reward of learning about them herself. It was possible he'd be able to use them against her somehow, but she doubted it.

Malfoy was staring at her expectantly, on the edge of looking irritated.

Luna took another breath. "It was like this… pink vapour. Or fog."

He cocked an eyebrow at her inclusion of a colour, but nodded. "Not dissimilar to how others have described it. Go on."

She shrugged, picking lightly at the opulent embroidery on the chair with a fingernail, and tried not to sound too evasive. "It's hard to describe what I did, how I got away from it – I don't know."

Malfoy met her gaze at this, his own sharp. "Got away. So you didn't stop it, didn't somehow end the spell while it was happening, but somehow escaped this… visualisation of the spell within your mind? Did you hide from it?"

Luna shook her head. "I don't think I could have," she admitted, twisting her hands together. "It filled up my head, like any other kind of gas would have. I couldn't stay there."

He looked a little confused, but seemed willing to go along with her. "Couldn't… stay in your head. Are you saying you started visualising somewhere other than the inside of your mind, for your consciousness to escape to?"

Before he had finished speaking, Luna was already shaking her head. "No. It wasn't just imagining. My mind was somewhere else. Physically… or, metaphysically, I suppose. Elsewhere."

His lips quirked, brows coming down. "You mean something similar to astral projection? Conventional magic isn't capable of things like that. There have been reports from remote areas, of course, but nothing's ever been replicable in any kind of formal research setting. Is that the sort of thing you're claiming?"

Luna smiled at him, and shrugged. "I've never heard of anybody else doing it," she replied simply.

Malfoy blew out his breath. "All right. Well, I suppose we'll go with that hypothesis for now. Can you describe what this… projection experience was like?"

She had to hold herself back and consider this; for the first time, her uncertainty wasn't because she was wary about telling him the truth, but because she truly didn't know how to respond. It was impossible to fully and accurately describe what she had seen and felt, of this she had absolutely no doubt. But she could try.

"I… stopped being myself. I was _bigger_." She paused again. "I was reaching out."

Malfoy just looked at her, impatient.

She shook her head and tried again. "I didn't feel like Luna any more. I could see everything, I think. I only remember… fragments. But I have this feeling – I think while it was happening, I saw more. Everything." She frowned, disconcerted by her sudden inability to articulate herself. " _Everything,_ " she repeated, and then, to her surprise: "Green."

He stared at her. "Everything green?"

Luna tugged at her hair in frustration. " _No._ It's – " She took a breath, and when she exhaled a split-second later, she was inexplicably far less sure of herself than before. "I don't know what I meant by that," she realised aloud, quietly. "Sorry." Where had that come from? She had no such memory. After a moment she realised her ears were buzzing faintly, and she frowned at the floor.

When she looked at Malfoy again, he was still staring, and had leaned forward slightly more. "Do you have any particular capability with Divination, Lovegood?" he queried suddenly.

 _From "Lovegood" to "Miss Lovegood" and back again in the span of a few weeks,_ she thought, vaguely annoyed. _I may get whiplash._ "I suppose."

"Do you believe that what you saw in your reaction to the curse was real?"

She shrugged helplessly and repeated herself. "I suppose. I really couldn't say." Despite, she noted, that a moment ago that had evidently been exactly what she was saying.

He scooted forward where he sat, apparently unconsciously. "Do you think you could do it again now?" he whispered, almost hissing in his agitation. Luna neglected to be amused at the extreme lack of irony.

"I don't know," she said honestly. She hadn't done it on purpose, really, since she was a child. There had never been a good enough time. Her mind always fell a little out of itself when she was painting, but she hadn't done that in a long time either.

"Try," he urged. She glared at him.

"It's not as easy as all that," she almost snapped, her voice rising slightly; but at his look of entreaty, she relented and closed her eyes. "Do you want me to look for something specific?"

He was silent a moment, then said, "Slytherin common room."

She concentrated, needing to focus on bringing down the walls she had so carefully built up over the years, in a way she hadn't had to when her mind was under immediate threat. It was incredibly difficult, bordering on brutal, and after a little while of trying she felt herself beginning to perspire. She centred her mind on the common room, willing her inner eye to open on the now-familiar space. A little of Malfoy's excitement and impatience, and the word _Father_ , bled through the opening she was trying to widen.

After what felt like hours of unceasing effort, the walls at last came down. Luna able to catch a glimpse of Orion Black and Rabastan Lestrange sitting in front of the fire, side by side, before her barriers snapped back up like elastic. She came out of the vision holding her head, tears of pain and exertion streaming down her cheeks. Malfoy sprang out of his seat, looking sincerely concerned, and after a moment of hesitation offered her a handkerchief. She took it gratefully, wiping at her eyes.

"I'm sorry," he offered, and she waved a hand at him. "What happened?" he went on, after an awkward pause.

"It's all right. You had no way of knowing, and neither did I." She closed her mouth, opened it again, and added, "I've spent… a long time… trying very hard _not_ to do that. It took a lot of effort, and several years. I'm not sure that I can do it at will anymore, and even if I were to teach myself how to again, I don't think I'd want to open myself to the possibility of it happening more often." She blinked. "And it hurts."

It still did, in fact. And she hadn't been able to see Malfoy's aura when she'd first opened her eyes, although it was beginning to fade back into her vision now.

"Did it hurt you when you did it in class?"

She considered this. "Not… exactly. But when it was happening, I knew it was going to be difficult to pull myself back together. I could feel myself falling apart, in a way that I'm not used to doing." _Not anymore, anyway._ "It was – uncomfortable." The realisation shocked her a little; that miraculous extension of herself had felt so natural at the time, but in retrospect, she wasn't sure she liked what it had put her through. Luna, the real her, not the nameless god-thing that had watched the earth from above.

Malfoy hummed in disappointment, the look of concern not leaving his face. "Well. That's… well." After a moment he asked, "Did you see anything at all?"

She nodded. "Yes, Black and Lestrange. They're in the common room together, or they were a minute or so ago. And…" She met his eyes. "Some of your thoughts and feelings too, actually. I heard the word 'father'."

Malfoy flinched, but looked infinitely more intrigued in spite of himself. Luna saw the question bubbling up in his eyes: _Have you tried that around Riddle?_ She waited for him to voice it, but he said nothing. Evidently he still didn't want to admit, even indirectly, whose thumb he was under.

"All right," he said finally. "I think that's enough for today. You look as though you've exerted yourself a great deal. Try to rest some, won't you? I don't want my subject dropping dead from exhaustion. I'll see you next week." At this clear dismissal, Luna rose automatically from her chair and left the room.

She was a little taken aback at his solicitous demeanour. It didn't fit with her first impression of him at all, but then again, perhaps she had been wrong.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

As per Malfoy's request, Luna tried to take it easy for the rest of the day. She spent some time with her friends, doing her best to relax, and then headed back to the dormitory to catch up on homework.

To her astonishment, the dormitory was not empty when she arrived, as it almost always was. Cecily was there, lying prone on her bed, not appearing to be doing anything other than staring out of the massive window. She glanced toward the door, saw Luna, and returned to staring vacantly into the depths of the lake. "Hi."

"Hello, Cecily," Luna responded softly. As quickly as she could, she retrieved her books from their place near her bed and made to leave, but the other girl interrupted her.

"How long have you known that you weren't supposed to be in Slytherin?"

Luna stopped. "Sorry?"

"You're not happy here," Cecily said tonelessly. "Everybody can see it. Your friends are from every other house but this one." She shifted to glare at Luna. "Why did you bother getting Sorted here?"

Luna opened her mouth to respond, and then paused. "Are you all right?"

Cecily attempted a laugh, but it came out more as a choking noise, muffled slightly by her pillow. "Why do you care?"

Luna stared at her. "Cecily."

Her tone of quiet reproof was enough to make the other girl sit up, sniffling and wiping at her eyes. She looked back at Luna sullenly, but said, "Sorry."

Luna waved the apology off and sat on the bed with her, a little gingerly. "What's wrong?"

Cecily's face crumpled briefly, then went blank again. Her eyes were very red. "Nothing. I don't know."

Luna was silent for several moments, and then asked as diplomatically as she could, "Is it anything to do with… who you've been spending your time with lately?"

"Spotted that, had you?" Her voice was flat. "I can't talk to you about him."

Luna couldn't stop herself asking, the wounded feeling of that night after the incident in Dumbledore's class suddenly bubbling to the surface like acid: "Why are you so loyal to him all of a sudden?"

Cecily met her eyes suddenly, bloodshot gaze oddly intent. "Why aren't you?"

 _That_ hit her like a blow to the chest, although Luna didn't want to think about why.

Trying to hold back the stricken expression she knew was taking shape on her face, she shook her head wordlessly and waited for Cecily to explain. Something in Luna's distress must have resonated, because Cecily's resolve seemed to fall away a little.

"I know he's awful," the other girl admitted. "I know… a lot of the things he asks me to do are wrong… and I know, as a Slytherin, I shouldn't care. I do, though." She breathed deeply for a moment. "But – it doesn't matter."

Luna gaped at her, stunned again into silence. "What do you mean, it doesn't matter?" she demanded after a moment, keeping her voice low. "He hurts people. It's _wrong_. You just admitted it."

"I don't know!" Cecily almost wailed, covering her face with her hands and curling up away from Luna. "I didn't have to think about it before! He never wanted me!"

 _Oh._ Suddenly the situation was clearer than water, and Luna was berating herself for not having figured it out sooner. "You're in love with him?" She knew the answer, but her voice crept up at the end anyway, making it sound like a question.

Cecily hiccuped and sat up to meet Luna's eyes again, clearly trying hard to control her breathing and keep from crying any more. "Yes," she said finally. "Yes, but you don't understand." She stretched her hand out toward Luna's, shuffling forward so she could reach. "You don't understand. We all are. It's like we're — imprisoned. Every one."

"Is that really all it is?" Luna inquired softly, eyes open wide, trying to control her anger. "You love him, so you let him do all of this. And not only that, but you do it with him – _for_ him?"

"Yes," said Cecily earnestly, gripping her hand tighter. "I know I — I know I've got a choice, really. But it never feels like it." She shook her head again. "I just have to be with him… and that makes it all worth it." Her breathing had steadied, and she was looking at Luna with an intense, level gaze; trying with all her might, it would seem, to make herself understood.

Luna ripped her hand away before she could stop herself. "I don't understand you," she whispered, in complete honesty. "I don't understand any of this."

Cecily laughed a little in disbelief, her eyes brighter now. "Oh, Luna! You can't really mean that. Haven't you ever been in love before?"

Luna closed her eyes at the sudden image of another handsome face, not Tom Riddle's, one she hadn't seen in a long time. She wondered at it a little, for a moment, but then spoke.

"I haven't, no. Not really. I almost was, with… one person. But I saw it coming, and I sort of just – went around it. Hid it from myself. It never had the chance to grow into that, I suppose." She was a little surprised at her own frankness, given that she'd never before admitted this even to herself, but she supposed that Cecily's raw honesty deserved a response in kind.

"Are you in love with _him_ , too?" Cecily asked bluntly, a smile tugging at her lips.

"No," Luna said instantly. She didn't have to think about that one, nor did she have any desire to.

"I don't believe you," her former friend declared, staring at her out of the corners of her hazel eyes.

At this, she'd had enough. "Believe what you like," Luna snapped. "There was no reason we needed to be enemies. You, and _he_ , started this."

"Yes, well," the other girl sighed, "I haven't got any friends any more, anyway. We all hate each other, stab each other in the back whenever we can, envy and spite each other. Just because we're all terrified children… and in love." She smiled sardonically. "It's tragic, really." Despite her caustic tone, there was something desperate in her eyes, something seeking a kind of connection, or empathy.

But for once, inexplicably, and in an instant Luna knew she would always regret, she found that she could not do it. She couldn't bring herself to lay aside her hurt, her revulsion, her bitter disappointment.

"How right you are," Luna remarked, her high voice wavering. Trying to control her anger and disgust, she picked up her books again and nearly ran out of the dormitory, biting back the urge to cry over her shoulder, _Stay away from me!_

She slept in the library that night, hiding in the Restricted Section with a key from Euphemia, which was given to her without question after her friend saw the look on her face.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

 _Saturday, September the 25th, 1943. 10:05 pm._

 _Another interesting development has been brought to my attention today. Apparently Abraxas Malfoy has been conducting an independent study with the Lovegood girl, right under my very nose, and has been hoping to keep it from my knowledge. My level of surprise was embarrassing, but then, I have been distracted of late._

 _It seems that at the end of the hour, that day I duelled Lovegood in Defence Against the Dark Arts, I had some half-formed inkling of getting Malfoy to stop her before she left the classroom. I placed a rather vague wandless compulsion on him to do something of the kind, which I promptly abandoned and forgot about within the span of a few minutes (I admit I can be, at times, fairly capricious; but I was fairly agitated at the time). Under my influence, he nevertheless was allowed enough leeway within the spell to ask her to help him with an independent study, to which she agreed. Apparently he is unhappy with my ability to place him under compulsion whenever I choose, and harbours some resentment over times that I have deigned to do so in the past. He wished to tap into Lovegood's abilities and somehow discern for himself a way of imitating her, and thereby escape my control._

 _I cannot believe this escaped my attention for so long. Still, after a little persuasion, he is eager to accede to my wishes. I have ordered him to stop dawdling and proceed directly to testing her with Veritaserum – outside of Merrythought's supervision, if possible. I doubt he has been or will ever be able to discover anything useful by simply questioning her; from what he has already learned, it appears that her abilities are not replicable by others, or in any case, not easily so. (When my time is not so occupied, I might try my hand at them, but at the moment such pursuits are not practical.)_

 _She may be disappointed that I will no longer allow her to learn more about her abilities, as this is evidently the reason why she agreed to work with Malfoy. This is a burden she will simply have to bear; ripping the truth of her knowledge about me from her lips with a truth-serum is a much more efficient use for these studies._

 _On a better note, our research into Nott's finding is progressing well. The subject has not given us any trouble as of yet._

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

A/N: Hey guys! I'd been planning to get this one out about a week earlier, but my beta and I have both been really busy with the end of the semester. I hope those of you in school have a manageable week of exams 3 Happy December! xo shai


	16. Chapter Sixteen

Recommended soundtrack for this chapter: "Smoke and Mirrors" by Gotye, "Luca" by Brand New

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

 **Chapter Sixteen**

After her second meeting with Malfoy, Luna returned to her daily routine as usual, spending free periods with her Gryffindor friends or Perpetua and making occasional passing efforts to focus on her schoolwork. When she reached the tail end of the week, she began to notice a conspicuous absence of any kind of suspect activity among her fellow Slytherins — rather like, she suspected, Riddle's lack of aura. Clearly there was something going on, but they were for some reason suddenly making an effort to carry out their business quietly, at least when in her company. Every Slytherin eye she looked into was studiously blank, every aura smooth and so nearly static that it must have required a frightening degree of self-control. Riddle might not have realised the nature of her particular talent, but he certainly understood that she could tell when people were hiding something; he must have drilled into his followers that they were not to reveal anything to her. Luna was unused to being _handled_ by other people in this kind of bland, profoundly Slytherin way, and it made her deeply uncomfortable. Was it a sincere effort to keep her in the dark, or was it one of his oblique taunts? Did he reallythink he could just lay low for a while, and she'd forget all about him?

She eventually came to understand, to her chagrin, that this was exactly what she'd been doing. In her disdain toward her callous and self-centred housemates, she'd practically abandoned her promise to Yancy to keep an eye on them in favour of distancing herself from them as much as she possibly could. And while Riddle had threatened her, even frightened her, his lack of direct action _had_ led her into a kind of complacency; she'd once again lapsed into thinking of him as an annoying teenager who liked to antagonise her rather than a future Dark Lord who wanted to kill or subjugate everyone she loved.

It hit her suddenly, on Friday afternoon after Arithmancy, that she still did not know what it was Riddle was doing. The Slytherin girls had effectively locked her out of the loop once Cecily had identified her as a threat, and she knew better than to try to get anything useful out of any of the others. Yancy was her only ally, and even he probably had no concept of the magnitude of Riddle's powers or the extent of his ambition.

When Saturday at last came round, Luna was hesitant about meeting with Abraxas Malfoy for a third time but resolved to go anyway. Malfoy hadn't done anything to suggest an ulterior motive as of yet, and despite being an open follower of Riddle, noticeably wasn't quite as fanatical in his devotion as some of his fellow Slytherins were.

As she made her way to the classroom where they had conducted their last two sessions of the study, she briefly entertained the idea of trying to turn him against Riddle. While it didn't seem likely, the thought of having an insider ear was appealing. Given Malfoy's naturally discreet and understated bearing, something told her he would make an excellent and subtle liar – a skill which, despite her ethical misgivings, she had come to see as valuable over the past weeks. Perhaps she should try to scope him out and see if he seemed willing to switch sides.

When she reached the classroom, Luna was surprised to find that Malfoy was not there waiting for her as he had been the past two times. The room seemed much shabbier and darker without his deliberately over-polished presence filling it, and Luna conjured an elegant little sculpture in the centre of the room to make herself feel better. A hare, well matched to the colour and texture of the walls and floor, but a bit less austere in sensibility. A tad obvious, maybe, but Luna enjoyed predictability from time to time; after all, one couldn't be truly unpredictable without it.

Just moments after she'd placed her finishing touches on the hare – brightening its innocent eyes, adding a little fluffiness to the stone tail so that it looked softer — Malfoy entered.

Really, he didn't so much _enter_ as _burst_ _in_ , although he immediately composed himself upon noticing her presence in the room, looking surprised and a little disconcerted.

"Lovegood," he managed, graciously enough. Almost instantaneously, she could see that something was wrong, although she didn't want to jump to conclusions about what. His eyes were red-rimmed and had large, dark bags under them, as if he'd had more than one sleepless night, and his normally languid aura was pulsing rapidly in a way that looked unhealthy. Luna frowned at him.

She knew he likely wouldn't tell her what the problem was, but she had to ask anyway. "Are you all right?"

"Of course." His reply was smooth and decisive, well delivered, if far too hasty to be convincing. By the half-formed grimace that briefly flickered over his face, he could see that she didn't believe him, but he conjured two chairs anyway and went on as if she hadn't said anything.

"So. Today I thought we'd move a little more into the practical side of your abilities. We know that you can resist the Imperius, simple compulsion. Auerbach suggested we look into other kinds, so I spoke to Professor Merrythought and she authorised me to try you on Veritaserum, which is a form of directed-complex compulsion." The words were falling out of his mouth in a rush, and he had pulled a little vial out of his robes and started waving it at her before he was even finished speaking. "As long as I only ask questions that are on a pre-approved list, she told me it's acceptable, so we'll be sticking to basics as much as possible and just testing your resistance to the potion. I'll ask you questions, and you try to lie."

For a moment, Luna didn't answer him, set on edge as she was by his obvious tension. She hadn't spoken to Merrythought personally since class on Thursday. The professor hadn't mentioned anything to her about the study, but she supposed it was possible Malfoy had simply waited until the last possible minute to ask her about it. Although it rationally seemed more likely that Malfoy was up to something, imaginings of Malfoy as her new double agent were still floating around Luna's head. If she was being honest with herself, too, she'd actually come to appreciate his company in spite of herself, and she didn't want to jump to the conclusion that he'd betrayed her.

And anyway, she rationalised, there was only so much damage a Veritaserum interrogation could realistically do to her circumstances. If he asked her a suspicious question and she was forced to answer, she could simply leave the room straightaway and seek assistance from a professor. It was immensely unlikely that he would hit on something useful to him on that first and only try he would get at questioning her. No one in 1943 knew of her identity as a time-traveller, the lion's share of her knowledge about the future would be entirely irrelevant to anyone in this time, and her awareness of the threat Riddle presented was already obvious. She had no idea what other secrets he might try to pry out of her, but she doubted they would be dangerous; Luna knew plenty of things, but they usually weren't things other people saw as important, at least not until much later. It was funny how that worked.

"Lovegood," Malfoy repeated, pushing the vial at her again. "All right?"

She reached out slowly and took it from him. With a nod, more of resolve for herself than assent for him, she drank it. When it hit her tongue, she couldn't suppress an involuntary shudder. Veritaserum had no taste, but there was a certain… _something_ about it that made her skin crawl, in much the same way the Imperius had. The potion was cold, almost thinner than water, and it parched her throat and nearly made her wheeze.

Unlike the Imperius, though, she had difficulty detecting its effects until Malfoy asked her his first question.

"Is your name Luna Lovegood?"

The spell of the potion locked around her tongue, forcing the answer out before she could stop it. "Yes."

Malfoy's brows snapped together, but there was a bizarre shade of relief in his eyes. "Come on, Lovegood. You can do it." He waited a moment, allowing her to compose herself, until she nodded again. "Are you in Slytherin house?"

This one gave her a bit more leeway, although he had no way of knowing that. This time she was able to sense it as the potion rifled subtly through her mind, looking for the truest possible answer she could give. Luna took a shot at pre-empting it.

"Yeeehh," she began steadily enough, but her lips betrayed her and tripped into a half-hearted "Maybe."

Malfoy looked pleasantly surprised at this. "Clever. Not technically untrue, but not the truest statement you could make. And it seemed like you even overcame the potion trying to make you say 'yes,' which was very well done, Lovegood."

She didn't open her mouth, but waited for him to ask another question, knowing the potion would force her to try to correct him if she drew breath to reply. As long as he abandoned this line of thought and asked her something else, she could get away with a lie by omission.

"Are you friends with Cecily Harlowe?" he inquired, doggedly intent gaze meeting hers over steepled fingers.

Luna's jaw dropped slightly, and her mouth began to move again before she could stop it. She hadn't been expecting that one, and she wasn't sure what the potion would try to make her say.

"Cecily… is not a friend," was what came out. What she'd intended to say, perhaps a little acerbically, was _Cecily is not well-suited to making friends_. Her point had almost come across, and she had been able to toe the line of the truth magic such that she didn't have to specify that Cecily wasn't _her_ friend.

Malfoy's lips quirked at this, and she reflected that he must have been expecting a more straightforward response in the negative. It wasn't much of a logical leap to assume that Malfoy knew about Cecily's various betrayals of Luna, entrenched within Riddle's inner circle as he was. But as it was, he had no way of commenting on the ambiguous veracity of her response without admitting that he was involved in those betrayals, however indirectly.

"All right," he said neutrally. "Tell me about your friends."

As this was not a yes-or-no question, the Veritaserum didn't immediately come up with an answer for her to say.

"I am friends with Euphemia Crinsey-Abbott, Everett Weasley, and Fleamont Potter." The spell didn't seem to count those who didn't technically exist at her particular temporal location, like Ron. She managed to resist mentioning Perpetua, and thanked her lucky stars that she hadn't had enough of a chance to befriend Yancy to feel any compulsion to add him in.

Malfoy squinted at her. "What about that little Ravenclaw girl? Fancourt?"

Luna wasn't sure why she felt so uncomfortable with him asking about Perpetua, but she acted on instinct and tried her best to conceal what she could.

"I see her around a lot," Luna answered easily, which was true enough. "She's very nice. I don't know that 'friend' is the first word I'd choose to describe her." She wouldn't be able to evade a direct query, but perhaps she could redirect his attention. "I spend more time with the Gryffindors."

"Do you care about her?" her inquisitor pressed, leaning forward.

Luna's mind went blank. How was she supposed to –

"I care about everybody."

He pursed his lips at her. "That wasn't really an answer."

"Actually, it was," Luna shot back, trying to keep the triumphant smile from creeping onto her face. "Premise A, Perpetua is a person. Premise B, I care about all people. The conclusion is implied."

It was a simple categorical schema, based on the same basic constructs of logic that were drilled into all the first-year Ravenclaws on their first night in the common room. Luna had had some difficulty with them at first, not wanting to accept that if _a_ , Professor Dumbledore was a wizard, and _b_ , all wizards were lizards, that _c_ , Professor Dumbledore was a lizard. A pretty third-year girl with dark hair had needed to explain to her the distinction between validity and soundness of an argument before Luna was able to grasp how the set of premises made sense. It was a slippery solution to her problem, one she hadn't been sure would work, but apparently the spell was willing to give her some ground on indirect answers so long as they were sufficiently logically obvious. And given how rubbish most witches and wizards were at logic – well.

Malfoy had gone curiously silent and wasn't meeting her eyes. "I think that's enough for today," he said finally. "You've come up with some clever solutions for avoiding direct answers, but it's not evident to me as of yet that this capacity is related to your resistance to simple compulsion."

Luna drew back a little, discomfited. That he would choose to call off the questioning so abruptly, at that particular point, made her uneasy, but she saw no benefit to remarking on it. "What do you think our next step is, then?"

He finally met her gaze, his expression perfectly easy. "Well, the obvious choice would be undirected-complex compulsion." At her questioning look, he added matter-of-factly, "Amortentia."

Luna blanched. "No."

"Miss Lovegood, it's the clear – "

She scrambled out of the chair and away from him, holding her hands away from her face as if she was trying to deflect an offensive spell. "No," came out as a choked whisper. "No. Absolutely not. No, we're done." Half-unthinking, she Vanished the sculpture that she'd conjured earlier and put her wand behind her ear with trembling fingers.

Malfoy stood, looking upset. "Lovegood, we'll be doing it under – "

"I said _no!_ "

"It's not nearly as – "

She whirled out of the classroom and slammed the door behind her with a wordless magical impulse, cutting him off mid-sentence.

Yancy. She had to talk to Yancy, let him know what was going on. Malfoy really _had_ been up to something with the study, damn it. Maybe it wouldn't cause her any problems, but it had been stupid of her to take the risk anyway. She could always have just waited until _after_ her task was completed and she wasn't going toe-to-toe with a megalomaniacal teenager to fritter around learning about her mysterious powers.

Her feet carried her to the library, where – _thank all the stars_ – Yancy was standing by one of the tables with a little Gryffindor girl, explaining how to use the reference numbers. Luna strode up and grabbed his arm, ignoring his half-formed apologies to the girl as she dragged him into a secluded spot. The look of agitation on his face faded into one of concern once he noticed her own disturbed expression.

"What's wrong?" he murmured, glancing briefly back at the abandoned first-year before meeting her eyes.

"The study's over," she whispered back in a rush. "I had to end it. Malfoy wanted to try Amortentia." Yancy's eyes went wide as saucers.

" _What?_ "

"I know. There's no way he can really have gotten approval from Merrythought for that, which means this whole thing was probably just a way of keeping an eye on me." She leaned against the bookshelf behind her, suddenly bone-weary. "I just thought you ought to know."

"R-right," he stammered, "of course." After a moment he said, "What sort of questions did Malfoy ask you? In the Veritaserum test."

Luna shook her head helplessly. "Nothing important, I didn't think. Mostly basic personal questions. It didn't last for very long."

Yancy blew out his breath. "Well… that's… that might be something. I don't know what yet."

"We'll find out, I suppose," Luna ventured, reaching for her hair and twining her fingers in it absently. Yancy nodded.

"Oh – before I forget," he piped up suddenly, "I've been looking into a few things. Selwyn's research, first. I don't know very much about it, but I can tell you it's starting to dip into dark stuff, illegal stuff. Some of the books I've seen him with in here are banned." A bright little smile formed slowly on his face. "Pretty stupid of him, actually. I thought about reporting him to Dippet, but I thought it might be a good idea to let him carry on for a bit, since we don't have any other way of figuring out what Riddle's really doing.

"And one more thing. You know that the faculty and staff tend to be a bit more free with their words in front of prefects than regular students, right?" At Luna's nod, he went on. "Well, I overheard some things. Professor Bornwise and Professor van der Mond were talking, and Professor Bornwise mentioned something about Professor Dippet having to deal with – listen to this – _centaurs._ "

Luna's pale eyebrows rose. "You mean the centaurs that live in the Forest?"

"Yes. Apparently they've been pretty riled up lately, and they seem to be putting a lot of pressure on Dippet for something, although I don't think most of the professors know what or why. I'm not sure if it's important to us or not, but I figured it couldn't hurt to tell you."

She bit her lip and nodded, remembering her encounter with Solarn on the day of the Sorting Feast. "It… might be important. I'll keep an ear out around the Slytherins and let you know what I hear."

"All right." Yancy looked over at the table where the first-year Gryffindor student was still sitting, kicking her feet and looking as though she was about to keel over from boredom. "I'd best get back over there and finish helping Laetitia with her research. Let me know if anything else comes up." With a quick, satisfied nod, he left her in the corner and returned to the table.

Luna stood there by herself for a few minutes, thinking. All she could really remember was that Solarn had recognised her as a time-traveller, and that he had been strangely upset at her mention of Firenze. He hadn't seemed very concerned with her being 'out of time,' as he put it, beyond a simple curiosity as to her motives, so it didn't come off as likely that the centaurs would be harassing Dippet about that. There were a number of variables in play here, most of which Luna didn't know anything about, and her lack of information made it difficult to draw any conclusions about what was going on or how Riddle was involved, if at all. Slytherin was almost certainly going to continue in its pattern of dead silence, so there was little chance of her getting any information from within her own house. If she was going to learn anything, she needed to go back to the forest and talk to the centaurs.

 _Later_ , was her only exhausted reaction to this thought. She was worn out with intrigue and mystery; she needed a rest. Rome wasn't built in a day, and neither was a time-travelling campaign against the machinations of the most powerful Dark Lord of the age.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

The following afternoon found Luna doing homework with Euphemia, Everett, and Fleamont in an empty classroom not far from the Gryffindor common room. As usual, the four of them were having difficulty being productive, but Luna was finding it impossible to care.

"I just don't understand why there have to be so many _rules,_ " Fleamont was saying. "I mean, theoretically speaking, there's no reason at all why we can't conjure entirely new forms of life. It's just a different kind of spellcrafting. A new frontier!" Euphemia giggled as he lurched up from his desk and struck a dramatic pose.

"It isn't, though," Everett argued, fidgeting with his quill. "True animation is still fringe magic at this point. And even if it wasn't, the ethics of creating sentient life for the sake of mere curiosity are always going to be questionable."

"He's right," Euphemia put in, still smiling. Fleamont made a face.

" _Ethics._ That's such a boring way of talking about things. Ethics are for Ravenclaws."

"Actually, most Ravenclaws would disagree," Luna said mildly. "A lot of them are more concerned with discovery for discovery's sake, just like Slytherins care more about what works. Figuring out where the line is, what's right and wrong, is supposed to be where the Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs step in."

"There you go again with your mysterious and inexplicable knowledge of Ravenclaw, Lovegood," Fleamont drawled, pointing at her. "One of these days you're going to have to admit that you were Rowena in a past life, and the Grey Lady is going to fall at your feet and worship you."

Unable to resist smiling back at him, Luna nevertheless had to gently correct him on one point. "She doesn't like to be called that. Her name's Helena."

"You're strengthening his case, Luna," Everett pointed out with a grin.

"She's nice!" Luna protested. "I can't help it if the rest of you don't want to bother getting to know the castle ghosts. Or the other houses."

"Actually, there's a thought," Euphemia said suddenly. "Ghosts aren't created with magic, but their existence apart from corporeal bodies imply some sort of ontology of soul that would influence creation of sentient life, right? Maybe if we studied ghosts we'd get a better idea of how to craft a true animation spell."

Everett made an interested noise. "That's… rather clever, Euphemia. I'm impressed." Euphemia beamed at him.

"Yes, well, even if the ethics are questionable I still think it's an interesting idea. I mean, all we have right now are transfigured or conjured animals, and then whatever a Patronus is."

"How are Patronuses different?" Fleamont wanted to know, his eyes sharpening with genuine interest.

Euphemia's face went faintly pink at the increase in his attention, and she went on eagerly. "Well, from what we know about Patronuses, we're not actually _conjuring_ the Patronus in the sense of generating it from magical energy. More like… summoning it. Its sentience isn't easy to study because Patronus magic tends to be unpredictable, not to mention how difficult the spell is to actually perform. But it comes from somewhere, in a way that, for instance, conjured birds don't – watch. _Avis._ "

With an elegant flick of her wand, Euphemia conjured three little red birds which hopped onto her desk, peeping, and then pointed at them. "Did you see how they sprouted out of my wand like that? And they're not real birds – there isn't any bird alive that looks like a common sparrow but has the plumage of a summer tanager. These aren't suited for any type of survival; they're created and sustained by magic, and thus aren't bound by natural rules." With another wave of her wand, she Vanished the birds. "Now, I didn't just kill those birds, because they were never alive. They imitate life, but they don't reproduce it."

"Still not seeing how a Patronus is different," Fleamont reiterated, shaking his head.

Euphemia sighed, gesturing expressively with her hands in her frustration. "Well – if I could conjure one for you, I could show you what I mean. A Patronus acts with a will in ways that a conjured creature can't, and it's sort of — _drawn out_ by magic, but not really created by it…"

"You can do a Patronus, Euphemia," Luna said suddenly. Euphemia dropped her hands and stared.

"No, I can't."

"Yes, you can," Luna repeated. "It's really not as difficult as you might think. A friend of mine taught me how. You can do it, I promise."

Euphemia's eyebrows shot up. " _You_ can perform a Patronus?" Luna nodded, privately amused by the flabbergasted look on her friend's face.

"I can show you how, if you'd like."

"Oh, please!" Euphemia responded instantly, her pale brown eyes shining.

"Why didn't you tell us this before, Luna?" Everett inquired, frowning quizzically. Luna just shrugged.

"Mysterious knowledge!" Fleamont shouted at the ceiling, throwing up his hands. "The girl's an enigma! You expect her to just _reveal_ the secrets of the universe to us peons, Weasley?"

Everett flapped a hand at him. "Quiet down, Fleamont. I want to see how a Patronus is performed."

Luna suddenly felt nervous. She was sure that Euphemia had the capacity to perform a Patronus successfully; that much was beyond doubt, given Euphemia's bright disposition, dazzling magical competence, and strength of will. However, her own ability to teach magic had never been put to the test, and she found herself wondering if she would be able to explain how to do it in a way that made any sort of sense. Her eyes watered briefly, and she suddenly missed Harry desperately. It became obvious to her, in a flash of irony, that she was trying to pass on his knowledge to his own grandparents.

"All right," Luna said after a moment. "Well – you know the incantation, I suppose."

Euphemia nodded. " _Expecto Patronum,_ " she pronounced clearly.

"Right. Well – all you need to do is perform this motion," she demonstrated the proper wand movement for Euphemia and then repeated it for good measure, "concentrate your whole self on the happiest memory you can recall, and say the incantation. Quite straightforward, really." She desperately hoped that this would turn out to be true.

Her friend blinked. "Is that all? But it's famously difficult. It must be more complicated than that."

"Well, let's give it a try," Fleamont suggested, pushing off from his desk and pulling out his wand. He performed the wand motions with his usual energetic hyper-intensity, constantly on the verge of appearing ridiculous in his vigorous overcommitment to any spell he bothered to cast. " _Expecto Patronum!"_

Luna held her breath, half-expecting some brilliant shape to come bursting forth from his wand out of the sheer force of his will, but no such apparition manifested itself.

"Couldn't do it," Fleamont said, appearing entirely unbothered by his abject failure. "Must be pretty difficult after all."

Luna sighed, wondering how to explain. "It can't just be _a_ happy memory. I'm not even sure everybody has one that works for the spell. It has to be… a soul-singing moment. The kind of memory that – you would be happy having only that memory, even if all the rest of them were erased. Pure, bright. A sublime memory." She shook her head. "I don't know if that makes any sense."

Euphemia had been listening quietly, her eyes unfocused on Luna but deeply intent. She raised her wand, performed the motion, and said in her cool alto, " _Expecto Patronum._ "

The silvery shape from her wand appeared more slowly than Luna was used to, almost as if it were unfolding out of the wood rather than leaping like Luna's hare or Hermione's otter. Its form was indistinguishable at first, but after a moment a pair of blinding wings spread forth, accompanied by an elegantly curved head and a large plume of gossamer tail feathers. The creature hopped onto the floor and cocked its head, regarding them. Euphemia looked to be almost in tears.

"What is it?" Everett asked in a hushed voice.

"It's a bird, Everett," Fleamont noted blandly. Everett glared at him.

"It's a Raggiana bird-of-paradise," Euphemia said quietly, staring at the small silver bird in wonder. "I saw one once, when I was on holiday with my cousins in New Guinea. The natives call it a _kumul._ "

"Well, now I've really been shown up," Fleamont commented without bitterness. "How shall I ever recover?"

Euphemia turned around to look at him, and though the movement was casual, her expression was one of such tenderness that Luna felt almost like an intruder.

"With an ego like yours, I think you'll be all right," she teased gently. Fleamont grinned back at her, eyes suddenly blazing.

Everett coughed discreetly. "I want to try, too," he put in, looking a little forlorn.

Euphemia turned back around, smiling encouragingly at him. "Well, go on then, Weasley."

" _Expecto Patronum!"_ intoned Everett, to no results. Luna shook her head ruefully.

"It might take a bit more practice, but I'm sure you'll get it," she consoled him. "You're a very talented wizard. Both of you are," she added, with a glance at Fleamont. Both of them looked pleased.

"Not as talented as you, Luna," Fleamont denied, cheesy grin still firmly in place. But the look in his eyes was one of genuine admiration, and Luna glowed.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

She returned to the Slytherin common room that evening in a delightfully buoyant mood, the likes of which she hadn't felt since before the war. She was going to find out what she needed to know about Riddle; she had a direction, she had help, and she had friends. Everything was falling into place. Before she knew it, she'd be back in her own time, and Harry would be there.

"Evening, Lovegood." A familiar voice cut into her dreamy haze like a deluge of cold water. "You're looking rather more bright-eyed than usual this evening."

Luna stopped dead in the middle of the common room. How had she not noticed that he was here? But there he was, lounging on one of the sofas in the corner, surrounded by a ring of followers.

"What do you want?" she said, entirely sobered now. If he was going to interrupt her good mood, she wasn't going to bother with pleasantries.

"Come over here and speak to me a moment, won't you?" Luna tensed. He had phrased it as a request, but the thin veneer of grace and cordiality that he had always maintained when speaking to her up till now was abruptly gone; there was an iron quality to his tone that made it clear he was commanding her, not asking.

Luna gritted her teeth and walked over, crossing her arms. She took a deep breath to calm herself, then said, "Yes?"

He wasn't looking at her. "I hear you've been teaching some of your little Gryffindor friends how to perform a Patronus."

"What if I have?" she responded warily, steadfastly resisting the urge to reach for her hair.

An awful, predatory little smile was playing about the corners of Riddle's mouth, and he finally met her eyes. "I wanted to ask if you'd be willing to teach me. Assuming you really can perform one yourself, of course."

"I would never." The rejection sprang from her mouth without thought, flat and bitter.

He laughed, and the sound was somehow both more beautiful and more horrible than it had seemed before; Luna didn't know whether she wanted to cover her ears and scream or make him do it again, and he _knew_ it, and she hated him all the more for her sudden absence of clarity.

"Just as well, I suppose. It's next to useless anyway, at least for those who don't intend to end up in Azkaban." He fiddled with the ring on his finger, pretending disinterest.

"How did you know about that?" she demanded, sounding more forceful than she felt.

The long-lashed green eyes narrowed in amusement. "I heard your voices from the hallway," was his response, delivered in a sickeningly blithe tone.

It was a patently obvious lie, and they both knew it. They had been near the Gryffindor common room, where Riddle didn't have any classes, nor any reason at all to be.

"I thought it unfortunate that you made the decision to call off your independent study with Abraxas," he went on, apropos of nothing. Luna felt a chill down her spine as she realised that he was now trying to make it as obvious as possible that he had been spying on her. Not every Slytherin in the room was one of his followers, and yet he felt at ease enough in his own power to casually admit to having her watched.

It was time to abandon the façade. She wasn't going to play games with him anymore, not if he was getting this bold.

"I'm not afraid of you," she informed him simply. There was no animosity in her voice, only a statement of fact. It was something he ought to be told more often.

Into his eyes came the expected flash of anger, followed by… amusement.

"Dear, precious girl," he crooned, "of course you are. Just not in the way you thought you would be – am I right?" His grin broadened. "Did you think I hadn't noticed?"

Luna stilled. _Of course he would do this_ , she thought furiously. It was a low trick, mocking her in front of a room full of people for something she had no control over. Worse, everyone would believe it was true, despite any protestations she might make to the contrary; he had made denial impossible, even though every bone in her body screamed against the implication, just as it had when Cecily had asked her about it that night on the dormitory floor.

That he expected her to be humiliated, to be angry, was obvious. Well, she was. But he didn't have to see that.

"I'm not afraid of that," Luna said dispassionately. "I simply choose to disregard it. Although I suppose it would be typical of a teenage boy to assume that others, like him, are unable to draw their attention away from…"

 _That_ did anger him, and he sat up, the smile gone, face flushed. His eyes were burning. "Have a care how you speak to me," he spat, "dear _Luna_."

Her first name; he'd known that would get to her. The sound of his voice forming the word was unbearable. She turned her face away to hide her flinch, and fled.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

A/N: Hey guys, finally an update! This chapter is a bit longer, to thank you all for your patience – it's been a really turbulent couple of months and a lot has been going on, so I appreciate you bearing with me.

You may have also noticed the presence of a recommended soundtrack at the beginning of the chapter. I've been thinking about doing something like this for a while, so I've actually taken the opportunity of this new update to go back and retroactively add recommended listening to all previous chapters (I've also deleted a couple of redundant authors' notes). Please feel free to check them out if you're feeling up to a re-read – I've chosen them all with care and I think they really add to the vibe of the story.

On that note, I thought I might mention again that I have two 8tracks mixes up as official soundtracks for the fic as well (my username is spookyshai, so you can find them on my profile). They were created before I started doing the per-chapter soundtrack system, so there is a bit of overlap in terms of the songs I chose, but there are also songs on the 8tracks that won't appear as recommended soundtracks on any individual chapter. I've also got a side blog on Tumblr that's solely dedicated to Tom and Luna (url: tunavibes) and a few fanvids up on YouTube if you want to check them out (the username is spookyshai, again).

Thank you all so much for your continued readership and support. I started this for myself, but I keep doing it for you. If you have any thoughts on the story so far or just want to say hi, please feel free to leave a review – I read them all and I love to hear from you guys. Best wishes! xo shai


	17. Chapter Seventeen

Recommended soundtrack for this chapter: "Half Believing" by The Black Angels

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

 **Chapter Seventeen**

That night was one of the worst of Luna's life, despite the fact that she'd previously spent long, hopeless hours in dungeons far less hospitable than those Slytherin house called home. After Riddle's awful voice chased her out of the common room, she got herself ready for bed as quickly as was humanly possible, ready for the worst in case her dorm-mates and their acid tongues happened to be in an uncharitable mood that evening.

But they didn't come, and neither did sleep. She lay awake, blank-eyed and alone, for the entire night. None of the others ever arrived.

When the sun finally dawned the following morning and light began streaming down through the lake and into the window by Carlotta's bed, Luna had long since decided she wasn't up to classes. Too many thoughts were clattering around in her brain that hadn't had the chance to be soothed away by sleep, and her magical senses felt deadened, making her deeply uneasy about the prospect of encountering Riddle again. A quick glance in Cecily's mirror told her she looked nearly as bad as she felt – skin sallow with awful-looking shadows under her eyes, hair somehow even more scraggly and unkempt than usual, white fingers twining together anxiously in a manner reminiscent of a spider's legs. She stood there for a moment, grimacing at her disreputable reflection and staring into her own eyes until they began to water, then turned away in disgust and began getting dressed. The vivid memory of Riddle's voice mocking her still made her feel ill, but today was not a day to be spent in bed. She'd allowed him the run of the school for too long, and it was not to be borne; something had to be done, and soon.

Instead, she meandered her way to the Great Hall and stood to the side of the entryway, bloodshot eyes tracking faster than usual as they hunted through the Gryffindor crowd for Yancy's face. When she spotted him, she made a beeline for his table and tapped his shoulder to let him know she wanted to talk. After he made eye contact and nodded his assent, she escaped to their usual meeting place in the library.

He arrived fairly quickly, to her relief, reliable as ever. "You look terrible," he noted with a little worried frown. "How much sleep did you get last night?"

Luna waved away the question, fingers twisting into her hair. "It doesn't matter. Listen, I think the Slytherins are up to something real. Riddle's getting bolder, and none of my roommates ever came back to the dormitory last night."

Yancy squinted at her. "Well, but – you do know the house-elves make up the – ?"

"It's not that their beds didn't look slept in. I was awake all night," she grated out. "I know. _Please_ trust me. They're doing something, and we need to find out what it is before someone gets hurt."

After a long moment of consideration, he gave a slow nod. "All right. I trust you." He nodded again, as if to confirm this to himself, then met her eyes. "What are you thinking of doing?"

She bit her lip. "I want to search his things."

Yancy's mouth fell open slightly. " _Riddle's things_? Luna, are you mad? They'll be _covered_ with alarm spells – even if you could get into the boys' dormitory, it's – "

"Not Riddle's," she amended hastily. "Sorry, I should've been clearer. I meant Selwyn. He's got key information somewhere, he's not paranoid enough to put alarms on his things, and probably not clever enough to notice if someone's been through them."

He was silent another moment, then, "How?"

Luna started rattling off her thoughts as quickly as she could. "It's a variation on the Notice-Me-Not Charm. I worked it out last year, but backwards, because I wanted to reverse-engineer a spell to help me get better at finding – never mind, that didn't work, anyway. This does, though, I promise." It _had_ been a shame to lose that pair of shoes forever, the pair that she'd been doodling on with coloured pencils since she was thirteen, but she figured discovering her new and improved Notice-Me-Not had more or less evened things out. The feeling she'd had when she realised she'd just crafted her own spell (or close enough to it, anyway) had reminded her very much of the look on her mother's face when she had seen Luna's very first artworks in crayon.

She reined herself in before she could get too distracted, blinking back the usual film of tears in time to register Yancy's response.

"Notice-Me-Not won't work," he was saying bluntly, eyes sharp. "Not on a witch or wizard, and especially not on a clever one, not for you. If they've been ordered to keep an eye on you, a mild general compulsion like that won't do anything. They'll spot it right off, just as soon as you start to do anything unusual. Like going into the boys' dormitories, for instance." He was very quick on the uptake, Luna reflected with pleasure.

"I know," she replied patiently, "and that's why _I_ won't be the one doing it."

The tall boy paled. "What – you mean – ?"

Luna favoured him with a bright smile.

Fortunately, Yancy didn't take too much convincing. He knew that the stakes were high, or at the very least that they might be, and that the worst that would likely happen if he were caught would be the removal of his Gryffindor prefect status – news, he informed her wryly, his family would receive with satisfaction rather than displeasure. Luna quickly shared with him her knowledge of Riddle's class schedule, which he looked a little askance at her for having, but he nevertheless agreed to her suggestion that the search should take place at three-p.m. Most of the Slytherin boys in Riddle's cadre who might walk in on Yancy had a free period just before, including Riddle himself, and Luna could watch to be sure all of them were safely out of the way before magicking Yancy, letting him into the common room and making herself scarce. Her comrade was a little concerned that their usual spot in the library might be too easily eavesdropped upon for a subject of this importance, and so the two of them made plans to meet on the edges of the Forbidden Forest early that evening. They parted shortly afterward, Yancy clearly trying to suppress his anxiety, but Luna feeling almost excited. She retreated back to the dormitory and tried to lose herself in building stories out of reading her textbooks backwards, but she couldn't stop her eyes from wandering over and over again to the clock.

Around a quarter to three (she didn't know for certain, because some twenty-odd minutes ago she'd forced herself to screw her eyes shut to stop glancing at the time), Luna made her way down to the common room and curled up in one of the isolated chairs in the corner where she would have an easy view of her housemates when they left to go to class. She noted that Riddle was already absent, although this was no shock given his well-known and slightly mysterious habit of arriving at classes several minutes early. Soon enough, most of the others began to file out as well. Focused as she was on the task of discreetly watching them leave and tracking who was left, Luna was mildly startled when a low, feminine voice at her shoulder addressed her: "Aren't you going to class today, Lovegood?" The tone might have been one of concern, if it hadn't been so dreadfully flat. It was Edith Selwyn.

Luna blinked at her for a moment before the lie came to her lips. "Oh – no. I'm afraid I don't really feel up to it. I've been a bit ill, you know."

"I didn't, actually," Edith responded. Her expression displayed no disbelief or suspicion, but those strange dark eyes were just a little too knowing for Luna to feel entirely comfortable with the interruption. After a moment, the other girl said merely, "I'll see you later."

"Bye," Luna replied, and watched Edith slink away from her and retreat soundlessly into the dungeon hall. At last, the common room was nearly empty, save for a few stragglers playing Exploding Snap on the rug – none of whom were in Luna's year or, to her knowledge, had any close ties to Riddle's inner circle. She quietly put down the book she'd been pretending to read and made her way to the dungeons' entrance, where Yancy was loitering in the hallway half-succeeding at appearing busy. With a quick glance around to be sure no one was paying attention, Luna pointed her wand at him and quietly intoned, " _Neamhshuntasach._ " A fairly simple Irish incantation, but not one that any of the Slytherins would be expecting.

"Bless you," Yancy muttered, his expression hard to make out under the strange Gaussian blur of the magic. Luna snorted.

"It isn't my fault you English schoolchildren only learn spells from Latin," she said airily, and led him into the dungeons.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Early evening came and went for Luna, who was waiting by herself just beyond the borders of the Forbidden Forest. Yancy failed to make an appearance, and as time crawled onwards, she became more and more certain that something must have gone wrong. After nearly four hours of fluttering nerves and straining eyes searching the woods for her companion, Luna at last abandoned the massive sycamore she had been hovering behind and braved the trip back to the castle in the waning twilight by herself.

Wondering briefly if he'd somehow forgotten his own plan, she checked the library, but found it empty of all but a few stragglers who were being hurriedly ushered out by the librarian, Mrs. Foster. At last she reasoned that Yancy might simply not have been able to make it out of the castle to meet her, and as it was late he could have just gone off to bed with the intention of speaking with her the following day. She wasn't really able to convince herself of the veracity of this theory; but the absence of any buzz of gossip in the hallways or the dungeons about a Gryffindor prefect being caught in the Slytherin dormitories calmed her a little, and so she went to bed, noting only distantly and through half-closing eyes the continued absence of her roommates which had set off her suspicions to begin with.

Luna woke too late on the following day to manage breakfast, but went through her classes as normally as she could, aware that her increasingly frequent absences and failures to turn in work were becoming conspicuous. Riddle was present in Arithmancy, although he limited his contact with her to one or two unreadable glances, and inexplicably absent from Transfiguration; Luna spent her lunch hour waiting in the library for Yancy, who again did not materialise. When Charms came round at one-p.m. and Luna had a chance to speak to her Gryffindor friends, she asked after him.

"He's fine," said Euphemia blankly. "I saw him five minutes ago at lunch. He was just talking about some prefect business, but not anything out of the ordinary. Nothing seemed wrong to me. Why, did he say something to you?"

Luna made some excuse and dashed out of class ten minutes early so that she could be waiting outside of his Muggle Studies class when the hour ended. She finally caught him trying to sneak past her by hiding behind a rather burly-looking seventh-year boy, utterly failing to disguise his ungainly height. It would have been funny if she hadn't been furious.

"Yancy Bulstrode _,_ " she clipped, trying her hardest to pitch her airy voice lower to avoid softening her tone, "come and talk to me _right now_ , please."

When his eyes darted to hers in something like confusion, she found her anger fading into unease. He trotted over to her obediently enough and asked only, "What's wrong?"

Luna could not hide the disbelieving scowl that came over her features. "What's wrong," she echoed incredulously, not even bothering to inflect the statement into a question. "What do you mean, what's _wrong_? You were supposed to meet me yesterday, after – what we talked about. Where were you? And why haven't you contacted me at all today?"

He just stared at her for a moment, and said at last, "Oh – that. I didn't think it was all that important."

Luna was nearly beside herself. " _What?_ "

Yancy shrugged. "Well, I didn't find anything. No evidence of any suspicious activity at all, actually. I think we really might have been barking up the wrong tree on this one."

She scrutinised his face for any trace of fear or a hint that he might have been lying, and found none. Her lips worked numbly for a moment before any sound came out of them.

"Yes," she said finally, hearing her own voice as if from somewhere far away. "I'm sorry for shouting at you. Perhaps I was… overreacting a bit. How silly of me."

Yancy flashed a grin at her, apparently failing to register the sardonic deadness of her tone. "It all seems almost funny now, doesn't it? Happens sometimes, though. I'm just glad we didn'treally have anything to worry about. I'll see you around, Luna."

She stood there in the hallway by herself long after he and all the other students milling around had left, completely numb. Had Yancy _really_ not found anything? She knew that Riddle was dangerous, that he had been toying with her and threatening her all this time – or had it really all been in her head? Perhaps Voldemort had just stumbled into the practice of making Horcruxes by accident, as a boy, and that had been what had broken his psyche beyond repair. Had she just been reading too much into Riddle's brilliant charm and transmuted it by herself into dangerous charisma? Had she simply over-interpreted his odd interest in her, turned it into a sequence of bizarre psychological torments that in reality had never existed?

Was this just another one of Loony Lovegood's imaginings?

The thought dangled in her head for a moment, fully formed and almost appealing in its harrowing simplicity, before she firmly dismissed it. _No._ Of course she hadn't just been making it up. Years of others constantly questioning her sanity occasionally took its toll on her confidence, but now was not the time for might not have found anything, but that didn't mean the evidence of her eyes and ears had been leading her astray.

As a matter of fact, now that she thought about it, it wasn't at all unlikely that he _had_ in fact discovered something incriminating – or been on the edge of it – and had his mind summarily wiped and turned against him by whichever Slytherin happened to be on hand. That would certainly explain his bizarre manner and the complete one-eighty he'd done since their last conversation. The more she thought about it, the more convinced of this theory she became.

She knew for a fact what kind of person Riddle was, and that he must be doing _something._ She would just have to find out what it was by herself, now. That was fine. She had realised from the moment Ron had vanished before her eyes, after all, that she would be alone.

Being alone did not, however, mean that she had no resources at her disposal.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

In the evening two days later, having waited so as not to call attention to a habit of leaving the castle late at night, she stole back out of the dungeons and made her way into the Forbidden Forest. She was more careful than ever to avoid being seen, but by now unconcerned that any of her dorm-mates would take special note of her absence. Following her memory as best she could and being careful to keep her wits about her, she made her way into the depths of the forest.

Reaching the borders of centaur territory took longer than she had expected, although she supposed that last time she had been sufficiently distracted that it hadn't occurred to her to track how long she'd been wandering through the trees, not to mention that she had first stumbled upon the centaur lands by accident. Her success became apparent at last when, as she wound her way through the thickening trees, a large hand gripped her shoulder and turned her roughly around. It really was astonishing how silently they managed to move.

Luna deliberately did not reach for her wand, instead slowly raising her hands in front of her in a gesture of non-aggression. "I just want to talk," she said steadily.

"What would a little witchling have to say to us that we might wish to hear?" snapped a low and unexpectedly female voice. Luna squinted, just barely able to make out her interlocutor's shape in the weak moonlight.

"I spoke to one of your kind named Solarn," she said carefully. "Might I be permitted to see him?"

The centaur-woman scoffed, long fingers twisting restlessly over the massive longbow in her hands. "My father? I think not. You must return to your castle, witchling. He will not speak to you."

"Please," Luna insisted. "It's about – " She hesitated a moment, and took a gamble. "It's about Firenze."

The centaur stilled. "And what would a little witchling know of my cousin?" she asked, her haughty tone suddenly dangerously blank.

Luna hardly breathed. "Has something happened to him?"

The other slowly stepped closer and leaned down, until her face – still difficult to make out in the darkness – was mere inches away from Luna's. There was a long silence.

"If you do not know that," she said at last, "then you know nothing. I will hear no more of your poisonous little serpent-tricks. You think we do not know of the serpent house, and your hatred of our race?" She turned away. "Leave our lands. Do not return."

"Please," Luna nearly snarled, blinking back tears of frustration. The centaur did not reply, only flicking her tail briefly as she disappeared back into the forest. Luna was by no means foolhardy enough to believe that any attempt to follow her would not be met with a far more firm response than words.

Out of options for the moment, she was forced to make a tactical retreat. She made her way back through the forest as silently as she could, her own anger and loneliness seeming to snap at her heels and drive her through the trees much more quickly than she had come.

So, an educated guess: something had indeed happened to Firenze, who was in fact Solarn's nephew. The centaurs' extreme reactions to her mentions of him indicated that he had either died, or was indisposed in a similarly dramatic manner. His death seemed astronomically unlikely, given that he was still living in her own timeline; might her and Ron's arrival have caused some sort of problem for the centaurs?

She put this idea aside as feasible, although it made her very uncomfortable to consider that their time-travelling efforts might have negative consequences not only in her present but in the current past as well.

Before she knew it, her feet had carried her back to the castle and she was able to slip back in without much difficulty. Her trip back to the dungeons was equally uneventful, and she entered the common room expecting that it would be empty, given that it was now approaching two in the morning.

There was, however, someone waiting for her. One pair of intelligent dark eyes watched her come in, and as she made for the girls' dormitory a pale hand reached out to clasp her wrist.

"Luna," said Edith.

Luna turned, and Edith released her wrist.

"I know you've been looking into Riddle. What he's up to." Her soft voice was entirely neutral, but Luna stilled in surprise nevertheless, not having expected a direct confrontation of this kind. She decided fairly quickly, however, that there was not much point in evading the accusation.

"Yes, I am," she replied at equal volume, her own expression just as bland.

"I like you," Edith confessed, blinking at her, "perhaps against my better judgment, but that is beside the point. I am concerned that this investigation will get you into trouble. The current actions of his inner circle are above my caliber, such that even my own brother will tell me nothing." She paused. "Even if you do succeed in discovering what it is _he_ is doing," the subject was made obvious by her emphasis, "I doubt he will react well, and I'm sure it is clear to you by now that the consequences to such may be dire." She stared at Luna, her gaze earnest. "I would urge you to desist, for your own sake."

Luna looked back at her, silenced by her surprise. That was the longest speech she had ever heard from Edith, and such frank expression of thoughts and feelings was just as unusual from the other girl. She was also rather touched by Edith's concern, although at this point there was little that could possibly sway her from her goal.

"Thank you," she said after a long pause. "I appreciate your warning, and I will keep it in mind."

"But you will not stop," Edith muttered, seeming to speak almost to herself.

Luna smiled at her. "No."

The taller girl waved a long hand in acceptance. "Do as you wish. I did not really think I could change your mind. I simply wished to do all I could for you."

In spite of all her self-assurance, the words sent a chill down Luna's spine. Even so, she accompanied Edith to the dormitory with her smile still in place.

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 _Thursday, October the 16th, 1943. 1:07 pm._

 _My research is progressing at a much faster pace now that I do not have to worry about that fool Bulstrode sniffing around in my affairs. Lovegood, too, seemed to be fairly easily cowed once I gave up that façade of friendliness and let her see how it really is; I wonder if she might continue making a pest of herself, but there is no chance that she will discover the source of my findings._

 _If I can master this new magic, once and for all gain true control over space and time and dimension, I will be more powerful than any wizard in history._

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A/N: Hi guys, it's been a little bit! I know this chapter is incredibly late. I've had a very difficult time the past six months or so, some pretty unpleasant medical issues that came up out of the blue and were obnoxious to deal with (I'm ok now though!), so thanks so much for all your patience. I'm very sorry that it's taken so long to publish this one. We're almost at the end of the first arc now (only one more chapter), so the action picking up should make writing a little easier from this point on.

Thanks so much again for your readership. Even those of you that just read and don't review or favorite, I really appreciate your attention and time. 3 Love you guys, and hopefully the next chapter will be on its way sooner rather than later.


	18. Chapter Eighteen

Recommended soundtrack for this chapter: "I Already See It" by Kye Kye, "Cycling Trivialities" by DYAN

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 **Chapter Eighteen**

Over the next week, Luna tried to occupy herself with homework as best she could. Professor Bornwise in Arithmancy had begun to notice the recent drop in quality in her work and had offered her the chance to improve her marks for the term with an extra credit essay. Luna had chosen to write on the relative usefulness of Tullus' Theorem in forecasting when an incumbent would leave political office and the accompanying complications of applying its results due to its incapacity to specify how (for example, political defeat, resignation due to scandal, assassination, natural death, or inexplicable extended holiday to Tibet). She was working on a similar type of project for Professor Dumbledore, who tended to be generous with opportunities for extra credit but ask for extremely advanced results. A little unidentifiable half-transformed creature with mechanical insides had been meeping around her things for a good several days by the time she managed to definitively turn it into a functioning watch that could not only tell the time but also measure and quantify the wearer's current level of interest in playing a game of Parcheesi.

Most of her other classes were not sources of concern. Defence Against the Dark Arts was nearly always old hat, although Luna did still enjoy Professor Merrythought's methods of teaching the subject, and Orion Black was a capable duelling partner. Charms and Care of Magical Creatures were likewise easy to coast through, especially with Euphemia and Everett sharing notes with her – though Fleamont, true to form, never took any and focused most of his energy on silently provoking his friends to laughter during lectures.

Divination was usually a bright spot in her Wednesdays and Fridays given that she was able to spend some time with Perpetua, who had dropped Arithmancy for Astronomy after the first week of classes. Professor Shearwater currently had them working on tea leaves, and on Friday the 22nd of October, Luna and Perpetua made plans to have tea together the following Saturday and get part of their assignment out of the way.

Ravenclaw prefect and Head Girl Sofia Hopkirk had graciously opened Ravenclaw Tower to Luna after hearing of her troubles with Malfoy, complaining for her part (rather at length) that he was unreliable, a wretchedly poor administrator, and impossible to work with, among a number of other failings. Consequently, Luna and Perpetua had commandeered a little round table and two chairs in the nearly-empty Ravenclaw common room on the appointed afternoon and were sitting together chatting and sipping Darjeeling.

"So," Perpetua began after a brief lull arose in the conversation, "is it really true you can perform a Patronus?" A small smile played about her lovely features.

Luna tutted. "Does everybody know, now? I might have known that Gryffindors would be such poor secret-keepers." Her tone was not as light as she had intended it; the reminder of her impromptu lesson with her friends brought up in turn the unpleasant memory of her confrontation with Riddle afterwards. "Yes, I can."

Her friend was quiet a moment, the smile gone. "Why are you friends with Gryffindors, anyway? Everybody knows Slytherins and Gryffindors are supposed to hate each other. You can't have so very much in common with them."

Luna gazed ruminatively into her tea. "Well – no." Some of the leaves were swishing around at the bottom of her cup. "But we get on really nicely. They're very kind, you know."

Perpetua grabbed her hand abruptly, and when Luna looked up, the other girl was staring at her anxiously. "Lu, why _are_ you in Slytherin? Why couldn't you have been in Ravenclaw with me? It's not as though you aren't clever enough; you know you are." The line between her fine red-gold eyebrows deepened, and Luna was distressed to see her bright eyes beginning to mist over in frustration. "And it's clear you hate it there. You hate everything about Slytherin – you haven't any friends in your own house. Just tell me why."

Luna gripped her hand back and sighed. "If I were going to explain to anybody, it would be you. But I can't – I really can't. I'm sorry." She glanced back at her tea. "We ought to finish this."

Perpetua nodded, her great red mane of curls tumbling over her shoulders. She apparently forgave Luna's silence on the matter of her house fairly quickly, as she made no argument to the change in subject. "It feels more like a chore than it should," she said regretfully. "I suppose it is schoolwork, though."

Luna smiled vaguely at her, and both of them quickly finished off their tea before trading cups.

"Let's see…" Perpetua murmured, squinting into Luna's cup. "I can't tell if this is a trident or an arrow. Help?" She made to offer the cup to Luna, then withdrew it abruptly. "No, wait, we aren't allowed help. I forgot." She grimaced and glanced at the textbook sitting on the table between them. "I suppose I'll call it an arrow and prophesy that you'll have, er… smooth travel."

The little squiggly line in Perpetua's cup meant change, but the leaves did not make it clear what kind. Vaguely unnerved by an emotion she could not have described in words, Luna took Perpetua's hand again, her expression intent. "We're done, then. Listen – did you want to learn how to perform a Patronus?"

Her friend's face lit up. "Oh, could I? Oh, Luna! Of _course_ I do!"

"Come on, then, we'd better clean this up."

The two of them made quick work of the teacups, cleaning them magically and replacing them in the little tea-cabinet on the wall, along with the kettle. Perpetua then dragged Luna out of the common room, so eager that she tripped over her own feet, and Luna had to suppress laughter while hauling her up off the floor.

Luna considered introducing Perpetua to the Room of Requirement, but after a moment decided it was no use trying to be secretive. There were no school rules prohibiting students practising together or teaching each other more advanced magic, especially not something essentially harmless to humans like the Patronus, and somewhere in her gut was a fiery conviction that some observers of a particular sort should be reminded that she did not fear them. Therefore, as it was an uncharacteristically lovely day out despite the mid-October chill, she determined that they would go outside.

Perpetua's breathless interrogation pervaded their exodus from the castle. "How in Merlin's name did you learn it so early, anyway? Who taught it to you? How long did it take you to learn? Is it really as dreadfully tricky as everyone says? I can't imagine it should have taken you half as long as it's going to take me – unless you had a very poor teacher – and even then, I'm sure you'll have gotten the hang of it like _that_. Do you know anyone else who can do it? What does it actually look like? I've heard rumours, of course, but surely it doesn't _really_ produce an animal made of clouds? …"

Luna let her carry on this way until they had marched a good distance away from the castle and were close to her favourite hill, the one she privately still thought of as the Whomping Willow's home despite its present state of emptiness. The sun was shining – rather weakly, but shining all the same. As the two of them scrambled to the top of the hill, Luna crouched down briefly to admire the way it glowed through a blade of grass. Perpetua was a little winded, not being the particularly active sort herself, and her questions had trailed off during the climb.

"Now," said Luna, whirling around to face her friend, who was red in the face and panting but still looking beyond delighted. "Take your wand out, go on." She laughed a little when Perpetua had to fumble around in her robes for it, and caught a playful glare from the other girl.

"I know the incantation already, like I suppose most people do," Perpetua told her, before she had the chance to begin explaining. " _Expecto Patronum,_ right? Fairly simple Latin. I've tried it once or twice," she admitted, pushing some of her wild red hair behind an ear. "I've never been able to get it to work. Can you tell me what I'm doing wrong?"

"It's not just the incantation," said Luna, and explained the principle of the spell as briefly as she could while Perpetua listened intently, her dark eyes slightly narrowed.

"When you say _focus_ on the memory – do you mean to try and relive the memory, to try and see the images and feel the sensations again as much as I can? Or to focus more on the feeling?"

Luna's smile faded a little. "For a truly happy memory, you should be able to do both fairly easily."

Perpetua wrung her hands, avoiding Luna's gaze. "Well – I was thinking of this one time when I was really little. With my mother. But it's not as though – I mean, I was really happy then. At that time, you know, in the moment. But it isn't exactly as though memories of my mother make me happy _now_. As you get older, you find out things about your parents, and you get more and more disappointed when you realize – that what they're doing isn't your fault. Because that means you can't fix it." Her brow was furrowed now, and she looked as though she was trying very hard to keep back tears.

Luna stepped forward and hugged her, then said, "Is there a memory that isn't of your mother?"

Perpetua's lips quirked. "Well, when you're a child – when you're young, your happiness is sort of… pure. There are no worries in the back of your mind, and you're not thinking of anything else but the fact that you're happy. Children are selfish that way, I suppose. But there's a sort of clarity to their emotions. I thought a childhood memory would be easier, produce a stronger spell – don't you think?"

Luna exhaled through her nose. "It's true that the memory I use is of my mother, when I was small. But…" She considered the matter for a moment. "Even if you're happy as an adult, and you have other things in the back of your mind, and you have problems… what matters is that you're able to let them go, if only for a moment. To be present in that moment, to be with the people you're with, and realise that whatever happens, whatever worries or obstacles come into your life, you'll be all right. Because you will." Suddenly she found herself staring at Perpetua earnestly, her vision blurry and overbright. _I never cried this much when Harry was alive,_ she thought distantly, but persisted. "Whatever happens, you can survive it and go on and eventually be all right again. You just have to be able to have perspective. And hope." She smiled. "And – maybe a little help."

Perpetua looked at her for a moment, and then smiled brilliantly back, the same slow dimpled grin that had lit her face the first day they had met. "Oh."

She was silent again briefly, and then, " _Expecto Patronum."_

A silver owl leapt out of her wand almost instantly and began silently winging its way toward the clouds, looking as jubilant as its mistress. Perpetua squealed with glee and threw her arms around Luna, twisting around to keep her eyes on the shining bird. "Oh, I did it! It's like a thing out of a fairy tale, don't you think? Oh, dear Luna. Thank you _so_ much. I'll never, ever forget this." Her voice softened to a whisper, but Luna could still hear her smile. "I'll use this one from now on. This memory, every time I do it. Thank you."

Luna hugged her back as the silver owl circled overhead, and forgot even to be reminded of another, colder voice saying her name in precisely that way.

She was in a bright mood when she returned to the dungeons that evening, and it brightened further when she came upon some new information.

She was walking down a corridor that led back to the common room by a somewhat roundabout route, wishing for a little time by herself to reflect on the day, when she heard the sound of footsteps in front of her and realised there must be someone else heading back to the common room at the same time. Looking up, she caught a glimpse of robes and a dark head disappearing behind the corner that turned into the main corridor leading to the common room. The person looked small, perhaps a third- or fourth-year.

On random, cheerful impulse, she thought to say hello and perhaps ask how their weekend had been, and quickened her pace to catch up. She hadn't tried to be friendly to another Slytherin in a while, but perhaps it was somebody she hadn't met yet. In any case, there was no harm in a simple greeting.

When she turned the corner, however, the corridor was empty. It didn't seem possible that the other student could have raced down the considerable remaining length of the corridor to the common room in such a brief period of time, and it wasn't as though the bare stone dungeons held very many hiding places, as Luna had discovered during the peak of her avoiding-Riddle-like-the-plague phase several weeks prior. It was exactly as though the student had Apparated – but that was impossible on school grounds, and in any case any student younger than fifteen couldn't have been trained in Apparition yet.

Only two explanations remained: an Invisibility Cloak, or a secret passageway. The former seemed so unlikely that she felt she could safely ignore it. The latter would more than likely be in use by Riddle's people, and Luna seized immediately upon this idea.

She no longer had access to the Marauders' Map, as it had disappeared along with Ron when he lost his bezoar and was yanked back to their own time, but it would have only served as confirmation for what she already felt certain must be true: that there was a secret passageway here in the dungeons, and that Riddle was using it. She would simply have to comb through the area by herself; in the moment, that seemed merely to add an enjoyable level of challenge to the whole matter. Luna found herself smiling, and for an instant felt as though Harry must be watching over her and helping her to succeed. The idea was pure foolishness, as Ron or even Harry himself would likely have told her in kinder words, but it made her smile grow just a little, and so she held onto it.

After a few moments of reveling in her discovery, Luna judged that now was not the moment to investigate further, and that she had better not be observed standing around where the secret passageway was known to be if she didn't want to make it obvious that she now knew of its existence. Casting a final glance down the corridor, she returned to a silent and unwelcoming dormitory to have defiantly pleasant dreams.

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Luna spent most of the week trying to find a time to have a proper look round for the entrance of the passageway, without success. It was difficult to hang around the dungeons outside the common room without her intentions being clear; she had to make it seem like she was either just entering or just leaving, and she could only be seen doing so by the same people a few times before her behavior became suspicious. More students than she remembered had apparently made a habit of spending all their spare time in the dungeons, because the common room was now very rarely empty even during mealtimes, and there were almost always people coming or going.

At last she gave up on trying to look during the day, although it drove her to distraction to have to attend classes with the knowledge that Riddle could be keeping dangerous secrets locked down there for her to find and interfere with to the fullest extent of her abilities. Her chance did not come until Thursday night, when the dungeons abruptly became conspicuously empty, and Luna surmised that the location attached to the passageway must have been occupied. While now was obviously not the ideal time to make an attempt at getting in, Luna was painfully aware that she might not get another opportunity to do so for several more days, depending on how far the Slytherins were willing to let their grades drop for the sake of keeping an eye on her. She made her way down to the spot where the probably-fourth-year had vanished, and began searching for the entrance to the passageway. Using a spell to probe for it crossed her mind, but it wouldn't do for her to set off any wards or magical alarms that might have been placed over it. In any case, whatever it was had to be physically built into the dungeons, as she had heard no muttered incantation and seen no evidence of spellwork by the vanished fourth-year.

After a careful look round for visual clues did her no good, she decided to try a more hands-on approach. Working quickly, she ran her fingers over and between the stones that made up the dungeon wall, not bothering with any that she knew the fourth-year couldn't have reached. She found no irregularities until she reached the corner where she had seen the student before his disappearance, and her hand fell upon a small and slightly misshapen stone that she had previously failed to notice. She hadn't thought to look this close to the corner, assuming that the passageway would be farther away. When she pressed on it, the dungeon wall in front of her seemed to grow somehow less substantial, and Luna was able to silently slip through it into a dark passage.

It was difficult to see anything without the light from the dungeon, as the false stones ostensibly blocked it out. Luna was hesitant to risk _Lumos,_ and waffled briefly over whether or not to try and proceed without vision. She thought for a moment that she might try conjuring glowing stones or dust to fall on the path in front of her, but if the Slytherins at the end of the passageway were to suddenly emerge into it, she could easily fail to Vanish them in time and thus accidentally reveal herself.

After a little while of standing there motionless, she realised that a current of air was blowing on her face and that it seemed to be coming at her from a fairly low angle. _Stairs?_ Luna wondered, and after edging forward a bit she was rewarded with an empty space under her foot, which indeed proved itself to be a series of broad stone steps leading downward. Gaining confidence, she began slowly descending them while keeping one hand on the wall.

An instant later, her worst fears were realised. A door at the bottom of the staircase opened and a pale green light streamed out, illuminating the stairs and threatening to reveal her. Luna scrambled backwards as silently as she could, cursing her own impatience. Now that she knew where the entrance was, she could easily have slipped inside when it was empty without revealing herself, but she had thoughtlessly entered the passage anyway and possibly risked losing her chance at changing the past. As she floundered on the stairs, her panicked brain registered one key fact: they were not expecting her.

" _Neamhshuntasach,"_ she whispered hoarsely, pointing her wand at herself. She felt a slight pins-and-needles sensation as the spell took effect. When it was cast, she got to her feet and shuffled as close to the wall as she could, praying that no shoulder would bump her in passing and ruin it.

A series of familiar faces came through the bright doorway and up the stairs, lighting their wands as they went. Walburga and Orion Black, holding themselves like royalty as usual; the Selwyn twins; tall, broad-shouldered Rabastan Lestrange; Evan Rosier; unobtrusive and plain Percival Nott; dim but handsome Antonin Dolohov; Cecily; the little fourth-year who had led her to the entrance. All passed by without a word. Not one noticed Luna.

Lingering at the bottom of the staircase were Malfoy and Riddle, who were discussing something in hushed voices. At last, with a nod, Malfoy bounded up after the others, taking the steps two at a time with his long legs so as to catch up. Riddle paused, glanced into the secret room once more, then extinguished the green light with his wand and closed the door before following. Almost safe, Luna closed her eyes and waited for the sound of his footsteps to fade as he moved past her and exited into the dungeon proper.

When the passageway was silent, Luna opened her eyes and nearly cracked her head against the wall with the speed at which she careened backwards, suppressing a scream into a whimper and then a silent, harsh exhale. He had not left, but was standing a little ways in front of her and staring into her face with a look of consternation. Evidently he had noticed something and somehow silently come back down the stairs to have a second look, and now she was caught out. She gripped her wand, white-knuckled, waiting for the inevitable curse he would try to incapacitate her with.

Riddle did not speak or move for his wand, however. He simply frowned and squinted, and after a moment she registered that he was not looking at her face, and that this was because he didn't see her. With a start she also realised that his usual annoying magical emptiness had not alerted her to his continued presence because he did not have it now; there was an aura around him, a heavy, glossy green so dark it looked nearly black. It reminded her a little of photographs she had seen of the deepest parts of the ocean – fittingly, it also contained monsters. Nevertheless, its presence was bizarrely comforting in comparison to the hollow space that normally surrounded him. Perhaps it only revealed itself when he was alone.

After an agonizing two minutes, he finally abandoned his scrutiny of what would have appeared to him to be bare wall, and left her in solitude. Luna regained her breath and slowly made her way down to the door, which opened easily.

When she shut the door behind her and illuminated the room, she saw a small, dank, circular chamber. There were no furnishings, no incriminating evidence, and in fact no trace whatsoever that it had been occupied a mere five minutes earlier. Whatever it was that Riddle was working on in secret with his followers and keeping so carefully hidden away, it was elsewhere.

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The following evening, Luna returned to the forest once more. Even if she was turned away again, or threatened, she had to make every effort to communicate with the centaurs and follow up on her one and only remaining lead. She was out of options for any further information-gathering within the castle, but she would not give up. Not yet.

About two-thirds of the way to the border of the centaur colony's lands, she was unexpectedly accosted by a long-fingered hand landing on her shoulder in the dark. She squeaked and jumped, and just barely managed to restrain her drilled-in Dumbledore's Army impulse to fire off a restraining hex first and ask questions later. Harry had impressed very strongly upon them that reflexes were everything, and that their first instinct in risky situations should be Shield Charms, disarms or harmless incapacitating spells like the Full Body-Bind. Luna hadn't forgotten the lesson, and the vaguely pacifist leanings of her youth had dwindled as the war had progressed. Centaurs, however, tended not to react well even to spell usage intended for self-defense.

A soft voice, presumably belonging to the owner of the hand, urgently shushed her. "You are the little witchling who came to the forest before, aren't you?" To Luna's mild surprise, the speaker was the female centaur she had encountered last time she'd come to the forest.

She nodded in response and helpfully supplied, "I'm Luna."

"Luna," repeated the centaur, then continued a little stiffly, "I must apologise for the way I received you the last time we spoke. I informed my uncle of your visit, and he has invited you to come and speak with him."

Luna whirled to face her, suppressing a heart-racing rush of excitement. "I accept. Thank you – ?"

"Tor," the centaur said shortly, but her tone was a little less aloof. "You may follow me." She waved a hand in the direction of the colony and moved off at a brisk pace, it clearly having never crossed her mind to offer her human companion a ride. Luna had to maintain a light jog to keep up, but felt no animosity toward Tor for the oversight, mild as it was. She was finally, _finally_ going to get some answers.

The two of them progressed deeper into the forest, skirting the borders of centaur territory and failing to cross into it for so long that Luna almost began to wonder whether Tor had lost her way. They encountered no other centaurs, and Luna could make out nothing in the inky darkness that looked like a centaur dwelling. Twice she tripped over roots or fallen branches and had to scramble to her feet and sprint after her guide, who made no effort to slow down to accommodate her.

At long last, they came to a clearing that must have been several miles into the forest. A familiar centaur form stood in its centre, tail flicking impatiently. Trembling slightly, Luna made her way over and bowed. To her great surprise, Solarn bowed back.

"Greetings, little witch out of time," he said quietly. "Your persistence speaks to the honour of your mission." He looked at Tor. "And your promptness in finding her, daughter, speaks to the quality of our bloodline." He did not say _well done,_ but by the shy smile Luna could just make out on the other centaur's face, she had heard it.

Tor made a kind of salute to her father, placing one hand at her forehead palm down, then sweeping it in a half-moon arc to her chest. She then addressed Luna. "I will stay to guide you back when you have finished, witchling." With that, she retreated to a respectful distance away at the edge of the clearing, out of earshot.

Luna turned back to Solarn. "Thank you for meeting with me," she said politely, a little uncertain of what to expect now that the pleasantries were over.

Solarn shook his head. "There is no need for thanks, traveller. I made a grave error in turning you away the first time we met. I allowed my emotions to control my judgment, and in doing so I failed to serve either the good of my line or the greater good of the colony. It is true that we centaurs do not like to involve ourselves with your kind, but this matter cannot be avoided." He took a breath, meeting her eyes steadily. "You know of my nephew. Perhaps you might discover what has befallen him, and perhaps we might see him return to the colony. He is our finest star-watcher, the greatest we have had in a century. And he is family." His dark gaze was pained.

Luna shifted. "I know him only by acquaintance, and I have no idea what's happened to him in this time," she admitted. "Any information you can give me would be helpful."

"He vanished," Solarn informed her, "shortly after a disagreement he had with the leader of our colony. It was assumed that he had left the forest to join another colony. Under circumstances like his, and given the severity of the disagreement, such an act would not be unheard of. After his disappearance, we did not speak of him. It is our way." He paused for a moment, seeming to collect his thoughts. "It did not occur to many of us that his disappearance might not have been voluntary. The circumstances… were extreme," he reiterated, his eyes darting away from hers to stare into the trees. "But I spoke to Tor, and she made clear to me that she did not believe it was in her cousin's nature to leave us for such a reason."

"May I ask what happened?" Luna ventured.

"You may not," Solarn replied without vitriol. "It is not our custom to speak of internal matters to humans. However, I can tell you that the incident began with Firenze observing something… unusual in the stars. Something that may have to do with the great enemy you spoke of." He met her eyes again. "In any case, the time of the dispute and his subsequent disappearance was not long before our first meeting."

A chill ran down her spine. "I first arrived in this time a few days before we met," she said blankly.

Solarn did not look surprised by this information. "Indeed. It is possible that my nephew was in some way affected by your arrival." He glanced at Tor. "I have not told my daughter of this. She would blame you for his loss." After a moment, he added, "While I understand the urgency of your mission, I cannot say that I do not feel the same."

"But I can find him," Luna blurted anxiously. "He's – somewhere here. I know it. I'll set him free."

"Only thus can you repay the debt you have incurred to our colony," Solarn agreed, "and only thus, I believe, can you further your mission." He looked up at the sky and frowned. "Our time runs short. I will tell you the rest of what I know as quickly as I can.

"Centaurs are a hardy folk, and are generally not as vulnerable to the magic of humans as your kind tends to believe. Magic, and most especially the magic of fate and prophecy, run in our veins. Where most creatures would perish, we persevere; where others are overtaken, we find a way to bear the weight. Our magic is beyond our conscious minds, like the magic that overflows from you humans as foa – as young ones. We simply look at the stars and see the fate of our people. In the same way, we feel a strong magical threat and our basest selves react. This magic is stronger than anything your kind is able to harness. It would shatter your little channeling instruments and break your minds, were you to try." This last was spoken with disarming frankness, despite the haughty words. "If your enemy has any connection with Firenze, if he seeks our power – it would more than likely kill most humans who tried. But if this one is as dangerous as you have said, as Firenze's vision of the stars has told him, perhaps he will simply go mad and many more will die. This cannot be allowed to happen.

"Little traveller – for your own sake, you must find my nephew. But it is for the sake of your people that you must stop your enemy. Do you understand?"

She looked into his wide-set black eyes and did not blink. "I knew that from the moment I saw him. You needn't worry about me."

Solarn signaled Tor, who began to approach them again. "I worry for my nephew, Luna. If he is not to be regained – then I will worry for you."

"We do not have much time," Tor hissed in frustration. "I will be missed when I am not at the border to be relieved from night watch, and you must get back to your castle before a search party invades our forest looking for you, witchling. Come!" She grabbed Luna's arm and threw her onto her back, nearly wrenching the arm out of its socket in the process. Luna rubbed her shoulder and did her best to hold tight with her legs.

"I'll find him, Solarn," she promised, her voice higher-pitched in her anxiety and surprise. Tor did not wait for her father to respond but turned and galloped out of the clearing at an impressive speed, forcing Luna to fling her arms around the centaur's torso and hang on for dear life.

The two of them made the journey back to the edge of the forest in record time and did not bother with goodbyes. Luna sprinted out of the forest and over the grounds, her sleep-deprived brain casting about for the incantations to a series of invisibility and attention-dispelling charms that she had never been able to master. Finally, aware that the spell would fail as soon as somebody intending to keep an eye out for her came upon her knocking about the castle in the small hours of the morning, she choked out the Irish incantation for her variation on Notice-Me-Not and stumbled her way back to the dungeons. Two third-years were awake in the common room writing essays; only one of them looked up at her arrival, and she spared him a rather cold, probably-bloodshot glance which made him hurriedly return to his work. So, Riddle would know that she had returned to the dungeons in the early morning. _So what?_ she could not stop herself from thinking, too exhausted and angry to think through the implications of that fact. The only things on her mind now were finding the lost Firenze and, more pressingly, sleep.

She could sleep through all her classes tomorrow for all she cared – as long as when she awoke, she was in good enough shape to go toe-to-toe with her enemy.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

A/N: Hey babes, so uh, turns out this isn't the end of the arc after all... the chapter that I planned ended up being way too long, so I cut it in two (and this first half is still pretty long for me, lol). The first arc will end after the following chapter.

Thanks as always for reading and supporting me, and for your patience. I'm pretty much resigned at this point to not really being able to update more often than once every couple of months. This did end up being posted a little later than I planned, though, seeing as it's midterm season and my beta had a lot of work to do before she could get to me. You may reasonably expect the next chapter to be up sometime in December, but I'll try to get it finished earlier if I can.


	19. Chapter Nineteen

Recommended soundtrack for this chapter: "Starboy" by SHAED, "People" by Kye Kye, "We Are There Together" by Sleep Party People, "Magic Me" by Imogen Heap

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

 **Chapter Nineteen**

Luna woke early, before the dawn. Her vision felt clearer than it had since before she first arrived in this dim and distant past, although she wasn't sure whether it was due to her magical senses finally acclimating to her temporal displacement or just to the renewed strength of her conviction to stop Riddle. Her roommates were all in their beds this morning for once, and she could see their auras pulsing languidly over their skin as they slept. Luna took a moment to sit and study them.

They were innocents, these girls, these quasi-friends and petty enemies. They might be cruel, might be thoughtless, callous, but they were still children, more so than she had been ever since the war had begun and she'd started seeing people die. The atrocities of Grindelwald had been before their time, and their lives were so far removed from the realities of the Muggle world war that they were able to think and behave as if it wasn't happening – though she believed that something in them must sense that people were suffering.

Luna herself knew little about the war, but the more time she spent in 1943, the more she felt that the Ministry must have gone to great lengths to avoid addressing the ethics of abandoning ninety-nine per cent of the world's population to their own trials and conflicts when one per cent could have stopped it cold. Back before the Ministry had put a moratorium on any criticism, she remembered reading somewhere that a few witches and wizards, disgusted by the Ministry's failure to act, had abandoned the wizarding world to work for Muggle governments and seek an end to the war. The passage had spoken of these rebels as oddities, outliers, rather than heroes or martyrs. Luna had not thought anything of it at the time, but now the idea that the Ministry had been – was – standing by and doing nothing turned her stomach.

She was flying blind in the past, and she had neither the information nor the means to change that part of history, even if that had at any point been her plan. But she was here to do _something_ , and if the only thing she ended up doing was cleaning up her own mess and preventing Riddle from profiting off of her own presence here, that was _something_. She would certainly not stand by and do nothing while he continued to build his power base and seek new means of committing evil.

Luna rubbed her eyes and quietly levered herself out of bed to get dressed. Today – Sunday – was October 31st, meaning the Hallowe'en Feast was tonight. Being a prefect, Riddle would have no excuse to miss dinner tonight; most witches and wizards tended to get a bit rowdy on Hallowe'en by force of habit, given that Muggles had traditionally been less suspicious of strange happenings occurring on the holiday before the International Statue of Secrecy had been put into effect, and Hogwarts students were no exception. That gave Luna at least a forty-five minute window to search the castle undisturbed.

There was no way of getting around the fact that her own absence would also be noticed, however. More than likely, Riddle would see that she hadn't shown up and send someone else to hunt her down at the first opportunity. She wasn't sure how aware he was that she was on to him about Firenze, or how much he realised that she knew, but he seemed to have a nose for threats. He'd noticed her almost immediately, after all, although some of that was probably her fault for failing to perfect her poker face first. Riddle's own poker face wasn't quite perfected either, though, she reflected unfeelingly. She'd been able to pick up on his obvious malice and megalomania almost instantly, even though she hadn't been sure exactly how like the later Voldemort he would be as a teenager before she'd actually met him. Her rational mind had known that he would likely be much the same, but she'd hoped differently. She hadn't wanted to admit it to herself, but Tom Riddle had been a bitter disappointment to her from the start.

Luna shook herself. This wasn't the time to stew in her own anger and ruminate on how _evil_ her adversary was; it was the time to act. As far as she knew, she had the advantage of him at the moment. Delaying her efforts would only give him more time to find out her goal and take steps to protect his secrets more thoroughly. She had to move tonight, there was no question of that. The only problem was how to disguise her movements.

Was there any way she could go to dinner, leave, and then return before her disappearance was noticed? Perhaps if she had asked Dumbledore to place her in another house, but no, with them sitting at the same table there was no chance of Riddle failing to recognise her absence. He was suspicious enough that he would be looking for her, if only to make sure she was in attendance and not off doing exactly what she planned on doing tonight.

Luna frowned at Cecily's peacefully sleeping face, frustrated. Well, she supposed she did have most of the day to figure the issue out, so it wasn't as though things were down to the wire just yet. Still thinking, she finished dressing and made a cursory effort at taming her sleep-snarled hair before leaving the dormitory. She dropped in on the kitchens to say hello to the house-elves and grab some breakfast without risking an inopportune encounter, then headed for the library.

The next four hours were spent researching with a fury of which Luna hadn't realised she was capable. She ran through all the major illusions and minor inattention charms, hoping at first to construct some sort of eye-repulsing juggernaut of an artefact, before reaching the disappointing conclusion that the sheer quantity of magic involved would almost certainly attract attention in and of itself. With a burst of inspiration, she thought of the Weasley twins and started looking into suitable distractions, but that too turned out to be a dead end; short of releasing a troll into the castle as somebody was said to have done the year before she'd first come to Hogwarts, nothing would reliably cause enough of a ruckus to draw Riddle's attention away from her conspicuous absence.

Luna slammed shut the copy of _Major Mischiefs For Magi With Moxie_ sitting on the table in front of her and slumped down over it, her vexation growing. The amount of literature she'd gotten through in such a small amount of time would have made Hermione proud, but she still had no clear plan. Would she have to just not show up to the feast, and say to hell with the consequences? A few weeks ago she might have done just that, but now something told her it was a bad idea. Maybe she was just getting too used to Riddle's games. It wasn't as though he had threatened her directly, after all, just tried to scare her.

She sat bolt upright. He had tried to scare her – with vague references to her friends and bald-faced implications that he was spying on her, yes, but _before_ that. That day in Transfiguration class, he had done something to conjure that horrible puppet of her that he'd pretended to choke. It had been wretched, at least grey if not outright dark magic, and Dumbledore had been furious. But it had been convincing. It really had been like looking in a mirror. _Irony, thy name is Riddle_. 'For 'tis the sport to have the enginer hoist with his own petard,' this worked, it would be hilarious.

What had the incantation been, again?… " _Fairea simulacrum_ ," Luna uttered softly, and then smiled.

Now to find a place to practise.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Four more hours later, Luna was more magically exhausted than she felt she had ever been, but her spirit was absolutely triumphant. She had at last succeeded in creating a convincing simulacrum of herself, after a series of lumpy terrors that had made her fear for the safety of her meagre breakfast in her stomach. Animating the copy was proving more challenging – she could only really get it to shuffle around, sit, and make some repetitive arm motions that might be taken for eating – but she presumed that as long as she made it hunch over as if she didn't wish to be spoken to and perhaps combined it with some very minor illusion magic, it should be enough to avert Riddle's attention for the duration of the feast. So she fervently hoped, anyway. As long as no one noticed the simulacrum didn't really breathe, there would be no cause for alarm.

She had ended up fleeing to the Room of Requirement in order to perfect her technique after a rather near miss with Professor Dimling of Ancient Runes, who had come bumbling into the darkened classroom she had been using. Apparently he'd just been looking for his notes, and she'd Vanished the failed simulacrum in time, but Luna had decided not to risk any more time in the main part of the castle in case some Snapeish disciplinarian was on the hunt for misbehaviour and happened to catch her. A little to her surprise, the Room of Requirement had only provided her with a fairly minimal 100-square-foot practice space with none of its usual fanciful accoutrements. It had worked for her purposes, however, and so Luna had simply given a mental shrug and used it without complaints.

The Room of Requirement's location was a bit inconvenient for her purposes, though. It was on the seventh floor, and so she now had to puzzle out how she was going to get her new friend down seven flights and into the Great Hall in time for the feast without being noticed. Its walking on a flat surface was satisfactory enough, but Luna did not have much faith in its ability to traverse stairs by itself.

After a little thinking, she pulled out Hermione's moke-skin pouch and helped the simulacrum inside, one foot in and then the other. A part of her felt a little bad about just shoving it into a bag and carrying it, but the puppet didn't seem too distressed by its mode of transport, if in any case it was remotely conscious at all. Recalling the conversation with Euphemia and the others about conjured creatures, she suspected not.

She left the Room of Requirement and jogged down the stairs, aiming to hit the entrance to the Great Hall right as the influx of students would hide the sudden appearance of her twin. When she got there, the crowd was a little sparser than she might have liked, but she was satisfied nobody would notice the simulacrum's slightly strange gait and expressionless face. Ducking into a nearby classroom, Luna quickly pulled out the simulacrum and checked it over for any ill effects from its brief time in the bag. She found none, and so simply cast her trusty Notice-Me-Not on it for good measure and directed it to follow a nearby gaggle of Slytherin girls. If it sat down at another house's table there might be a problem, but nothing about its usual behaviour under its enchanted animation indicated it would do anything besides go to the Slytherin table, sit down, and pretend to eat once the food appeared several minutes later.

Luna watched the simulacrum shamble away and breathed a small sigh of relief when it made the turn to enter the Great Hall. The Notice-Me-Not was designed to divert direct attention, so if everything went as it should, her fellow students would register its presence in the Great Hall without paying any further notice to it. Nobody would be looking for her outside the Great Hall during the feast, and presumably nobody would notice if it lingered in its seat afterward until she returned to dispose of it.

Now that that was done, it was time to get to work. Luna did not have time to do systematic reconnaissance of the entire castle the way that she had done with Riddle's secret room in the dungeons, but she had a few ideas. The third floor corridor that had, according to rumour, once housed the Philosopher's Stone back in her time seemed like a good place to start; Luna thought she remembered that it had remained disused after Harry had retrieved the Stone, and it seemed reasonable to at least check if it had contained anything suspicious fifty years earlier. She also knew the location of the Chamber of Secrets thanks to Ginny, although she wasn't sure how to get inside and did not especially like the idea of wandering around a Chamber that would still contain a live basilisk. She did feel it was necessary to look, though, seeing as Riddle obviously already knew where it was and how to open it. He'd already used the basilisk to cause the deaths of those two Muggle-born boys as well as Moaning Myrtle, so it stood to reason that he might be making use of the Chamber again. There were a few other hidden locations that looked like viable options, as well.

Luna cloaked herself in her Notice-Me-Not, took a deep breath, and headed for the third floor corridor.

Her search did not go well. The third floor and every inch of the dungeons contained nothing beyond dust, scratchings of graffiti ranging from the mildly offensive to the outright bigoted, and the occasional overlarge spider – Luna wondered idly as she jogged through the dungeons if Acromantulae came in a spectrum, and if Professor Kettleburn, not given to the care of highly dangerous magical beasts to such a great degree as Hagrid, would be likely to know. She checked what she thought she remembered being Moaning Myrtle's bathroom, too, but as she hunted through the stalls and checked the sinks she began to grow increasingly uncertain if it really was the right bathroom; the infamous ghost apparently hadn't taken up her residence back in the castle yet, and Luna had not been able to find much time to talk to Myrtle after the very beginning of her second year, concerned as she had been with her living friends and other, less shrill ghosts who didn't make fun of her socks. Luna suspected Myrtle hadn't thought too kindly of Ginny after the incident with the diary and had somehow sussed out their friendship. In any case, trusting that this really was the right bathroom, it appeared that the Chamber of Secrets was impossible to access at the moment without blowing up the sinks. While she seriously considered it for a few minutes, it would take too much time and the damage would be difficult to explain in the aftermath, even if the gamble paid off and Firenze really was hidden down there. If she couldn't find him elsewhere and became truly convinced he was in the Chamber, she would have to find another way down.

At the end of her rope, Luna wracked her brain for ideas and finally decided she might as well see if she could hunt down a ghost who knew something. It was not a good time for this strategy, given that most of the house ghosts would be in the Great Hall during the feast, but she was quickly running out of options and she evidently hadn't given herself enough time to plan. Because Helena was so shy, she tended to vanish early from feasts and go off by herself before the newer students could ask her too many questions, so Luna thought it reasonable to try for her. She was running out of time, as it was nearing the hour when the feast would normally be concluded.

Ravenclaw Tower was empty, as was the stairwell leading down from the Astronomy Tower; Helena had a habit of finding the highest windows in the castle and staring out of them at the sky. On a clear October night like this, Luna realized suddenly, she would probably like to see it without the barrier of glass. Helena also made a habit of floating around outside when there was no danger of being seen. As she was nearing the courtyard where Helena usually liked to look at the moon, however, Luna stopped dead and stared at the wall, almost not believing her eyes.

A familiar door had appeared in a place she did not remember it being, and a soft orange light was streaming out from under it. The Room of Requirement, which normally manifested very consistently on the seventh floor, had warped to the ground floor – seemingly for no other reason than to catch her attention. That was obviously too suspicious to ignore, but Luna found herself hesitating. Could Riddle have tampered with the Room's enchantment somehow? Might this be some sort of trap?

 _It doesn't matter,_ she told herself firmly. _Whatever it is, I have to investigate. I can take care of myself. If it is a trap, Ron will be along sooner or later to find me in any case._ That "sooner or later" constituted several months was a fact she chose to ignore.

Luna strode forward and slipped inside. As soon as she saw the Room's contents, the reason for its oddly restrained behaviour earlier became immediately clear.

It was the "hiding" version of the Room of Requirement, still just as massive as ever and so chaotically strewn with every kind of magical object, instrument, artefact, and trinket that it would normally be impossible to find anything abandoned here without any prior knowledge as to its location; but when Luna stopped to scrutinise it, she realised that some objects were blinking in and out of existence, accompanied by little _thuds_ or _creaks_ or _clinks_ as the things under them or on them shifted or fell. The amount of magical tension in the air was such that it was nearly tangible, making the hairs on Luna's neck stand on end and those on her head frizz wildly and float unnaturally upwards. If she had to guess, she would say that the Room of Requirement was trying its damnedest to keep whatever was contained inside it from exploding the entire castle – or, at the very least, making all its enchantments go absolutely haywire.

The chamber was brightly illuminated by the orange light she had seen coming from under the door, and Luna carefully made her way across the cluttered floor, doing her best not to step on anything that looked breakable. At one point she tripped and her heel landed on a china teapot that she narrowly avoided smashing, but the teapot shrieked at her so loudly anyway that she was forced to cover her ears.

As she drew closer to the source of the light, it revealed itself as some sort of massive orb. Of what it was made, she could not possibly have said; it seemed almost gelatinous, but at the same time somehow brittle and extremely heavy. Its surface was pulsating almost unnoticeably. Deep within the orb was her quarry, revealed at long last. Firenze looked much the same as he had in her own time, although his face was visibly younger. His eyes were open but unfocused, and he was moving with such incredible slowness that he had to be in some sort of suspended animation.

Lost for a moment in her own curiosity, Luna reached out and touched the orb with a finger, and was interested to find that it produced no sensation in her hand beyond a mild prickling. At her touch, a spasm of energy seemed to run through it, and when Luna blinked the orb was gone. A loud _thud_ and a quiet groan alerted her once again to Firenze, who was struggling to his – feet? hooves? She rushed over to him and threw his arm over her shoulders, helping him up as best she could.

"Thank you," he wheezed in his familiarly low, lilting voice. "Thank you. I do not know who you are, but thank you."

"Do you know what happened to you?" Luna inquired, beginning to mentally shuffle through a list of ways to get him out of the castle unnoticed.

Firenze grimaced. "I… know some of it. I was in the forest, preparing to… but I was overtaken by something. A wave of light fell over the forest and surrounded me like a star, and then my vision was obscured, and I could not move. A little human, a young human like you, he found me and I was brought here. He and some others were trying to do your kind of magic with – with the star, but I do not know what they meant to accomplish. They brought me… here." He looked around uncomfortably. "Too much rigid, manipulated magic. Too much dead wood. I do not like being within these walls."

Luna suppressed a remark on his later reversal of that sentiment in his eventual decision to teach here. It seemed he'd been too close to her and Ron when they'd initially arrived, and had somehow been trapped in the margins of the disappearing time spell. "Your uncle and your cousin sent me to find you," she said tersely. "We need to get you back to the forest as quickly as possible."

Firenze nodded, then shook his head. "You will be seen. I must go myself. I can do it," he insisted at her look of concerned skepticism. "Wild magic is not for you to use, but I can ride its currents when needs be."

She smiled at him a little in amusement. "You sound just like your uncle."

He looked surprised, then smiled back. "What is your name, witchling?" he asked.

Luna bowed to him. "I'm Luna. Please give Solarn and Tor my regards."

Firenze paused a moment before bowing back and then, to her complete shock, leaning forward and patting her gently and a little awkwardly on the head. "Thank you, Luna," he said solemnly. He turned, drew himself back and galloped toward the wall, and then leapt upwards and was abruptly gone.

She stood in silence for a minute, poleaxed, before breaking into a fit of hysterical giggles. The whole thing seemed so perfect and yet so ridiculous; but she remembered after a minute or two that she did not have time to waste marvelling at the strangeness of the evening. Luna took off for the door, anxious to get back to the Great Hall in time to Vanish her simulacrum before it was noticed.

It took her less than five minutes, although she couldn't have said exactly how much less, to reach the massive doorway. She paused a moment to regain her breath before entering, but as she was in the middle of doing so another bizarre image presented itself to her, and her breathing abruptly stopped.

Perpetua Fancourt was being marched out of the Great Hall by two adult wizards. They were obviously not professors, and they looked absurdly tall next to the tiny red-haired sixteen-year-old. Perpetua herself was wide-eyed and ashen-faced, and looked as though she were about to be sick.

Perhaps there was some sort of emergency involving her mother? Luna knew who Perpetua Fancourt the elder was, of course; she'd invented the Lunascope and had had her own Chocolate Frog Card, but Luna had no recollection of when she was supposed to have died. She thought she remembered it being relatively recent, in her time, but she could think of no other explanation for what she was seeing.

Shaking herself out of her stupor, Luna took a few steps toward Perpetua, but the other girl caught sight of her and gave a jerky shake of the head. _Something's wrong_ , she mouthed, and then her face fell into such a wretchedly miserable expression that Luna felt her own heart fall into her stomach. She watched Perpetua walk away from the Great Hall, hunched and pale and looking to be on the edge of hysteria. Away from the Great Hall, and… out of the castle.

Perpetua's reaction, though alarming, did not really tell her anything about the situation. Luna was so anxious about her and so pumped with adrenaline and nerves that she forgot to get rid of the simulacrum before dashing into the Great Hall, but she hissed a hasty " _Finite_ ," at the Slytherin table as she ran by, barely stopping to think about whether anybody would notice.

Luna headed straight for the Gryffindor table. Euphemia was conversing politely with another prefect that Luna didn't know, and Fleamont was balancing a spoon on his nose for a trio of first-year boys. Everett, however, saw Luna coming and rose, motioning her aside.

"What's wrong with you?" he asked evenly. "When they came to take Fancourt away, you didn't even look up. I thought the two of you were friends."

"We are friends!" Luna snapped at him, louder than she intended. She took a breath and quietened herself with some effort. "I was… indisposed, sort of. What's going on?"

Everett scrutinised her for a moment. "How do you mean, indis – ? Did you make yourself go deaf, or something?"

"Please tell me," Luna grated out, her high voice strained with frustration.

"She's been expelled," Everett said simply. "Someone tipped off Dippet, and her things were searched. She had some sort of contraband – mostly dark texts, I think, the sort of thing you wouldn't find in the Restricted Section. Bornwise tried to speak on her behalf and turn it around, but Dippet wouldn't listen." He pushed up his spectacles and glanced at the Headmaster. "I think he's still spooked from the deaths last year."

"Who tipped him off," she said, her voice flat enough that it did not sound like a question. Her ears were beginning to buzz. _Wrackspurts,_ she thought to herself, and then, _You damned well know who._

"No idea," Everett replied with a frown. "Do you need to sit down? Listen, Luna, if she's been falsely accused or if there's been some kind of foul-up, I'm sure she'll be allowed back. The Ministry will get to the bottom of it. Luna?"

"Bye," she murmured, and drifted away. Down the table. Out of the Great Hall. Out of the castle, the way she'd seen Perpetua go, although her friend was by now long gone. Over the grounds to the hill, the Whomping Willow hill, where Perpetua had cast her first Patronus. The memory seemed far away, as if it had happened months ago, years, instead of mere days. Luna sat on the frozen ground, shivering, and thought.

This was Riddle's doing. She knew it was. He had spotted what she loved most in this time, what was nearest her heart, and had ripped it away from her. He'd framed an innocent girl, maybe even ruined her life for good. All this – why? To hurt Luna, to frighten her perhaps, to remind her who was in charge because she'd become too complacent, too self-assured and self-righteous in her singleminded pursuit of her mission, and he'd wanted to take her down just when she least expected it. Just when she thought she'd won.

She had no doubt that he had done it, just as she had no doubt that he had done it without hesitation or any semblance of remorse. The lives and happiness of others meant nothing to him, as surely as they meant the world to Luna. This was just another confirmation.

Remembering Perpetua's terrified, confused, brokenhearted expression was almost too painful for Luna to bear, but the image kept appearing in her mind. Perhaps the Wrackspurts were putting it there. Her beautiful brown eyes had been the size of dinner plates. Luna would have thought it was funny, once upon a time, if she hadn't known what was happening. If she hadn't known Perpetua. If she hadn't known Riddle.

Luna rubbed the heels of her hands into her eyes until she saw spots, her chest heaving as she half-sobbed, half-hyperventilated. She hadn't realised until now how much she'd really cared for Perpetua, how much she'd relied on having her around. Perpetua had been unlike anybody she'd ever met – kind, and a good listener, like Ginny, but so timid and gentle. She'd _understood_ what it was like to be treated as if you were lesser, for no reason at all other than being different. She'd never laughed at Luna, not once, not even when she'd told her about Nargles. Luna loved Ginny with all her heart, but Ginny – eleven years old and half-incredulous, if half-delighted – had laughed. She'd forgiven Ginny quickly, but she'd never really been able to force herself to forget, no matter how hard she tried.

Caught between the lingering hurt of the old memory and desperately missing her first and best friend, Luna sobbed harder, huddling into her knees against the biting wind. Why did this have to happen? Why had he done this to her? Why had she even come here in the first place? Why had she ever thought she could get through to –

Luna's sobs ceased, and she took several deep breaths and sniffled, her brow furrowing.

Riddle was treating her as an adversary.

Why?

She hadn't really taken the time to think on it, which was uncharacteristic of her. She'd half-assumed that he saw her as a threat from the beginning, and then she'd become completely caught up in finding out what he was up to and stopping him from hurting anyone. He was treating her as an adversary because she'd treated him as one.

Luna thought it was an understandable misstep. There was trauma tied up in the name and person of Riddle for her, more than she'd perhaps acknowledged; she'd expected him to be entirely different from Voldemort, but the amount of similarity she'd seen had thrown her off and frightened her, and she'd reacted with anger. Riddle wasn't exactly doing himself any favours, either; he clearly didn't care about being liked, except by those whose respect and admiration he expected to benefit from.

After a moment, though, Luna had to revise that thought. His attempts to hide his cold nature in front of her had been completely transparent, but he had seemed to really be making them, at least at first. It was only later, once she'd expressed clear distrust and then hostility toward him, that he'd mostly tossed aside the façade and stopped trying to placate or befriend Luna.

She had no illusions about him seeking her good opinion from any motivation beyond self-interest; presumably, he had been confused by her immediate dislike of him initially, and then had become (correctly) concerned that she would disrupt his operations at the school. But the fact remained that it had been Luna, not Riddle, who had ultimately carried their uncomfortable and tense acquaintance into outright and undisguised antagonism.

Why _had_ she come here in the first place? It hadn't been to act as a vigilante against the machinations of a teenaged boy. No matter what she did in this time to stop him, she wasn't going to stop him eventually becoming Voldemort. She was playing a defensive game, and she had understood in the beginning that winning would be impossible as long as she was still playing by the rules.

Luna had come back in time not to style herself as an emissary from the future, here to condemn Riddle for all the evils he had yet to commit. She had come to _help_ him. She had wanted to become his friend, to show him that he could be better. To save him. And not only that, but she'd been certain that she could do it. Perhaps she hadn't been sure of the details, but she'd had faith.

Somewhere along the line, she'd lost that. But it didn't have to stay lost.

Her entire frame shaking, wracked with violent shivers from sitting out in the frigid night air for nearly an hour without a coat, Luna was almost too cold to smile.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

She didn't bother trying to be stealthy while she descended the stairs. It really didn't matter whether anyone heard her or not, but in any case the noise coming from the hidden chamber was so loud that there was very little chance of anyone catching footsteps coming down the stairs from the dungeon corridor.

Something had told her he would be here, celebrating. She bit back her anger at that reminder. Perpetua was alive, at least. Perhaps she would be allowed back into Hogwarts, perhaps not, but she would have a life, magical or no. That would have to be enough.

As she drew closer to the door, though, it became clear to her that celebration was not what was happening. People were talking loudly, but many of the voices sounded upset rather than triumphant, as she'd initially believed. _Oh_ , she thought suddenly. He must have discovered by now that she'd found and released Firenze, destroying whatever chance he had of studying the time-bubble further.

That idea made her hesitate, and she stared sightlessly at the greenish light from under the door for a few moments, briefly paralysed. But at last she took a deep breath, thought of Harry, and pushed it open.

The difference from the bare chamber she'd seen before was night and day. The room was filled with luxurious furnishings, some of which she suspected had been pilfered from the common room, others of which looked old enough to have been sitting in the Room of Requirement for centuries at least. A magnificent green chandelier hung over the whole garish affair, spilling verdant light over the entirety of the chamber.

Riddle was seated on a dark, throne-like chair in the centre of the room. Surrounding him were his followers, talking loudly with each other as he sat and listened. He looked so calmly imperious, so comfortable in his position of command, that she felt he resembled Slytherin himself; yet his face was so beautiful that anyone else might say he looked like an angel.

For what seemed like the hundredth time, she felt herself be drawn in a little by his curiously potent charm, the heavy and almost tangible aura of power and potential that he wore about him like a cloak. Now, however, the bitterness and resistance that usually accompanied that realisation was not there. Instead, Luna felt a strange calm and impassivity settle over her. She knew exactly, with perfect clarity, what she was going to do.

The chamber fell silent as she entered. After a long, drawn-out moment, Riddle's eyes slid to hers. It really was strange how they did not remind her of Harry's in the slightest, although the colour was similar.

"Miss Lovegood," he said, feigning politeness. "What a surprise."

"No, it isn't," said Luna. Rabastan Lestrange, seated to the left of the throne, shifted as if to rise, but Riddle stayed him with a glance.

"No, it isn't," he agreed easily, leaning forward and propping his chin on his hand. "So tell me, Lovegood, why have you sought me out?" A cold smile flickered over his lips. "Have you been rendered bereft by the loss of your little Ravenclaw? What was her name – Persephone?" He mock-pouted at her. "Were you thinking of seeking your revenge?"

Luna closed her eyes briefly and took a breath. When she opened them again, the expression was gone from his face, and he was staring at her expectantly.

"Perpetua," she corrected evenly. "And no, that isn't why I'm here."

He scrutinised her for a moment, eyes narrowed, and then sat up. "Really," he said in an oddly toneless voice. The aura-hole around him pulsed, and she caught just a flash of that dramatic midnight green before it subsided. Luna believed that she was seeing him in a state of genuine surprise.

"Yes," Luna said. What greatness he could have, she thought as she looked at him. Not the awful kind, not the sort he would have as Voldemort. But how beautiful his heart would be, if it were filled.

Before she really knew what was happening, she had moved forward and thrown her arms around him. He smelled of soap and the tangy, cloying buzz of dark magic. She could hear his heart rate increasing.

Hands landed on her shoulders and violently shoved her away, and he was screaming _Get off me, get off me, you little whore!_ She stumbled backwards, unbothered. Somebody else stepped forward and backhanded her across the face, and Luna processed only vaguely the flare of pain from a split lip and the accompanying fact that she was now on the floor. The stones underneath her bruised hands seemed almost to be singing. Luna coughed and licked her lip reflexively, briefly pausing to appreciate the uniqueness of the moment and the energised, pregnant silence that surrounded her. Turning points like this came perhaps once or twice in a lifetime, and she wanted to remember this one. Slowly, unsteadily, she rose.

Riddle was staring at her, wide-eyed, white-lipped, so furious that he looked half-terrified. "How _dare –_ " he whispered, but stopped, as if he could so little believe what she had just done that he had no real rebuke or punishment ready to hand.

Luna swayed, and began to speak.

"Under the moon and sky which housed my forebearers and granted to them the power and nobility of magic," she began as clearly as she was able, "this I swear without deception or reserve."

The oath of Merlin, from Willard Wayfair's _Prince of Enchanters._ His completely poleaxed expression told her he recognised it, as she'd hoped. Good.

"From this moment forth do I render to thee every loyalty and service in good faith that thou request. My life becometh thine, thy guard and counsel mine." Her eyes did not leave his. "Should thy will oppose my own, still shall I obey thee. Should thy properties and holdings come to nothing, still shall I toil for thee. When Death for me, at the last, outreach his hand, still shall I remember thee." She felt herself begin to tremble as the weight of her words seemed to fill the room. This was old magic, a variation on the Unbreakable Vow that did not require a wand. It was not a Death Eater's oath, because Luna would not be a Death Eater; but it was binding.

"Never shall my fealty be broken or my oath abandoned till thou ask it," she gasped, the oath beginning to clog in her throat like honey as the magic strengthened. "By the names of my father and mother and by the purity of my blood, I – Luna Lovegood," she'd almost said Merlin, but had corrected herself at the last moment, "give fealty to my lord and master, Tom Riddle."

The room fell entirely silent. Riddle just looked at her, blinking as though he were gazing into a bright light.

Without another word, she rose and left the chamber for the dormitory. No one moved to stop her.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

 _Monday, November the 1st, 1943. 12:04 am._

 _I do not understand._

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A/N: Aaand there's the end of the first arc. Pretty exciting! :) I honestly can hardly believe we've made it here after nearly 2 years, it seems so amazing and surreal. And we're not even halfway done! Hope y'all are pumped for arc two!

Thanks as always for your readership and patience with my slow updates. Love you guys! 3


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